
I 






LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Chap. Copyright No. 

Shelf. J2l-74 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



WITH OPEN FACE 



OR 



JESUS MIRRORED IN MATTHEW 
MARK AND LUKE 




BY 



ALEXANDER BALMAIN BRUCE. D.D. 

u 

PROFESSOR OF 
NEW TESTAMENT EXEGESIS IN THE FREE CHURCH COLLEGE, GLASGOW 

AUTHOR OF 

"THE KINGDOM OF GOD," "THE TRAINING OF THE TWELVE," 

"ST. PAUL'S CONCEPTION OF CHRISTIANITY," 

ETC., ETC. 




NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 

1896 



K~ 



COPYRIGHT, 1896, BY 
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 



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,7. S. Cushing & Co. — Berwick & Smith 
Norwood Mass. U.S.A. 



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PREFATORY NOTE 



Of the thirteen chapters contained in this volume, 
nine have appeared in The Expositor in the course of 
this year. The last four chapters appear now for the 
first time. 

These popular sketches of the spirit and teaching of 
our Lord, as exhibited in selected scenes from the 
Evangelic Records, are the overflow from severer 
studies on the first three Gospels meant to meet the 
wants of professional students of Scripture. In the 
preparation of the larger work I have seen some things 
in a fresh light, of which I endeavour in the following 
pages to give general readers the benefit. 

The last chapter is an attempt to realise an idea 

which has been in my mind for years : to set forth for 

the instruction of children, in the form of a historical 

catechism, the main facts concerning Jesus. The 

" Christian Primer " may be welcome at the present 

time, when the subject of Education is again engaging 

public attention in England. Should it be received 

with favour, a larger catechism on a similar plan may 

be attempted hereafter. 

A. B. BRUCE. 

Glasgow, September 1896. 



111 



CONTENTS 



-*o*- 



CHAPTER I 

PAGE 

The Prophetic Picture of Matthew .... 1 



CHAPTER II 
The Realistic Picture of Mark 20 

CHAPTER III 
The Idealised Picture of Luke 41 

CHAPTER IV 
The Synagogue Ministry 62 

CHAPTER V 
The Mission to the Publicans 83 

CHAPTER VI 
Jesus longing for Apt Disciples 102 

CHAPTER VII 

The Escapes of Jesus 121 

v 




VI CONTENTS 



CHAPTER VIII 

PAGE 

Your Father who is in Heaven 140 



CHAPTER IX 
The Worth of Man 159 

CHAPTER X 
The Moral Ideal 179 

CHAPTER XI 
The Cross in Sight 198 

CHAPTER XII 
Gethsemane 218 

CHAPTER XIII 
The Christian Primer 237 






WITH OPEN FACE 



OR 



JESUS MIRRORED IN MATTHEW 
MARK AND LUKE 




WITH OPEN FACE 



OR 



JESUS MIRRORED IN MATTHEW, 
MARK, AND LUKE 



CHAPTER I 

THE PROPHETIC PICTURE OP MATTHEW 

The three first Gospels present essentially the same 
view of Jesus as a preacher, a teacher, and the uncom- 
promising foe of Pharisaism. Yet on closer study dis- 
tinctive features reveal themselves in their respective 
delineations. In Mark, which may with much proba- 
bility be regarded as the earliest Gospel, Jesus is pre- 
sented realistically as a man, with marked individuality 
in experience, speech, manner, and action. In Matthew 
He is presented as the Christ, in His Messianic dignity, 
yet as a very human, winsome Messiah. In Luke He 
appears as the Lord, the exalted Head of the Church ; 
still a true man, yet bearing the aspect of a saint with 
an aureole round His head ; near us in His grace towards 
the sinful, yet in some ways wearing a look of remote- 
ness like a distant range of hills softly tinged with blue. 
The first Evangelist, as is well known to all readers, 
B l 



Z WITH OPEN FACE 

loses no opportunity of verifying his thesis : Jesus the 
Christ. Some of his prophetic citations are unimpor- 
tant, referring to matters purely external, of no signifi- 
cance for the characterisation of Jesus. An extreme 
example of this class may be found in the closing words 
of the second chapter : " He shall be called a Nazarene." 
Apologists have busied themselves in trying to discover 
the Old Testament basis of the reference, and some in 
their despair have had recourse to the hypothesis of 
some lost book of prophecy whence the quotation was 
taken. Their labour is well meant but vain. Far 
better to confess that this is one of the weakest links 
in the prophetic chain of argument, and try to make an 
apologetic point of its weakness. That really can be 
done. It is obvious that no one would ever have 
thought of a prophetic reference in the instance before 
us unless the fact had first been there to put the idea 
into his mind. If the home of Jesus had not been in 
Nazareth, who would have dreamt of searching among 
the Hebrew oracles for a prophetic anticipation ? The 
fact suggested the prophecy, the prophecy did not 
create the fact. And this remark may apply to many 
other instances, where we have not, as in this case, 
independent means of verifying the fact. Sceptics 
have maintained that not a few of the Gospel incidents 
were invented to correspond with supposed Messianic 
prophecies. The truth probably is that in by far the 
greater number of cases the historical data were there 
to begin with, stimulating believers in Jesus as the 
Christ to hunt up Old Testament texts fitting into 
them as key to lock. 



PROPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW 3 

Some of Matthew's quotations reveal delicate tact 
and fine spiritual insight. Whatever may be their 
value as proofs that Jesus was the Christ, there can be 
no doubt at all about their value as indications of what 
the Evangelist thought of Jesus. These indications 
are all the more valuable that they are given uncon- 
sciously and without design. The Evangelist's aim in 
making these citations is to satisfy his first readers that 
He of whom he wrote was the Great One whose coming 
all Jews, Christian and non- Christian, expected. But 
in pursuing this design he lets us see how he conceives 
the character and ministry of Jesus, and this is really 
for us now the permanent religious use of these 
prophetic texts. 

Three of these texts stand out from among the group 
as specially serviceable for this purpose. The first, 
quoted from Isaiah ix. 1, 2, is introduced in connection 
with the settlement of Jesus in Capernaum at the com- 
mencement of His Galilean ministry. The important 
part of the quotation lies in the words : " the people 
which sat in darkness saw a great light." 1 Jesus of 
Nazareth, the Light of the dark land of G-alilee — such 
is the Evangelist's comprehensive conception of the 
memorable ministry he is about to narrate. On exam- 
ining his detailed account we perceive that in his view 
Jesus exercised His illuminating function both by 
preaching and by teaching : understanding by the 
former the proclamation to the people at large of the 
good news of the kingdom as a kingdom of grace, by 
the latter the initiation of disciples into the more recon- 

1 Matt. iv. 16. 



4 WITH OPEN FACE 

dite truths of the kingdom. But it is to be noted as 
characteristic of the first of our canonical Gospels that 
while the preaching function (kerygmd) of Jesus is 
carefully recognised, it is to the teaching function 
(didache) that greatest prominence is given. " Jesus," 
we are told, " went about all Galilee, teaching in their 
synagogues, and preaching the Gospel of the king- 
dom." 1 But beyond such general statements little is 
said concerning the Preaching. On the other hand, 
of the Teaching, especially that given to disciples, 
who were indeed its chief recipients, copious samples 
have been preserved. " The Sermon on the Mount," 
brought in immediately on the back of the general 
announcement just quoted, belongs distinctively to the 
Teaching. However many more might be present, 
disciples were the proper audience, insomuch that the 
more appropriate name for the discourse would be, not 
the Sermon on the Mount, but the Teaching on the Hill. 
There Jesus was the light of the few that they might 
become the light of the world. And He was their 
light by being their Rabbi. At the close of the dis- 
course the Evangelist makes the comparison between 
Jesus and the scribes given in Mark in connection with 
the first appearance of Jesus in the synagogue of Caper- 
naum. 2 The comparison implies resemblance as well as 
contrast. Jesus in the view of our Evangelist was a 
scribe or Rabbi in function, anti-Rabbinical in spirit, 
and in virtue of both facts the spiritual light of the 
land. Because He was a Teacher He might be com- 
pared with the other religious teachers of the people 
1 Matt. iv. 23. 2 Matt. vii. 29 ; Mark i. 22. 



PROPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW 



whose professed aim it was to communicate to their 
countrymen the knowledge of God. Because He dif- 
fered utterly from these teachers in method and spirit, 
the light He offered was light indeed. For their light 
the Evangelist believes to be but darkness, the deepest, 
most ominous phase of the night that brooded over 
Galilee and other parts of the Holy Land, as he will 
take pains to show in the course of his story. 

The conception of the Christ as the Light-giver 
implies that the leading Messianic charism is wisdom. 
But that the author of the first Gospel took no one- 
sided view of Messianic equipment, but fully recog- 
nised the claims of love, is shown by the prophetic 
quotation now to be noticed. It also is taken from the 
Book of Isaiah, and is in these words : " Himself took 
our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses." 1 In his gen- 
eral preliminary description of the Galilean ministry, 
Matthew gives a prominent place to a healing function : 
" healing all manner of sickness and all manner of dis- 
ease among the people." 2 The words just quoted from 
the prophet show us the light in which the healing 
ministry presented itself to his mind. What struck 
him most was not the marvellous power displayed 
therein, but the sympathy, the phenomenal compassion. 
This was not a matter of course; ordinary people did 
not so view the remarkable cures which were taking 
place among them. What gained for Jesus fame 
among them was, beside the benefit received, the pre- 
ternatural power evinced by His healing acts. Only a 
deep glimpse into the heart of Jesus could enable any 



1 Matt, viii.17, from Isa. liii. 



2 Matt. iv. 23, 



6 WITH OPEN FACE 

one to see in these acts something more and better than 
power, and to find in His curative function a fulfil- 
ment of the striking Hebrew oracle. Such a glimpse 
had the Evangelist. He read truly the innermost 
meaning of the acts, some of which he reports, and so 
laid his finger on the grand distinction of Jesus. And 
one who saw the central significance of love in the 
character of Jesus was not likely to suppose that its 
manifestation was confined to healing acts. He would 
expect it to reveal itself also in " gracious words " 
spoken for the healing of sin-sick souls. And though 
fewer such words are reported in Matthew than we 
might have desired, there are some that mean much to 
one who duly considers them. 

By far the most important of our three prophetic 
oracles is the one remaining to be mentioned. It pre- 
sents, so to speak, a full-length portrait of Jesus, in 
prophetic language, which will repay detailed study, 
feature by feature. This citation, like the other two 
taken from Isaiah, occurs in Matthew xii. 18-21, and 
is in these terms : J 

" Behold my servant, whom I have chosen ; 
My beloved in whom my soul is well pleased : 
I will put my Spirit upon Him, 
And He shall declare judgment to the Gentiles. 
, He shall not strive, nor cry aloud ; 

Neither shall any one hear His voice in the streets. 
A bruised reed shall He not break, 
And smoking flax shall He not quench. 
Till He send forth judgment unto victory, 
And in His name shall the Gentiles hope.'* 

1 1 quote the Revised Version. The original is in Isaiah xlii. 1-4. 



PROPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW 7 

The attractive picture is introduced by the Evange- 
list at this point in his narrative to show the true Jesus 
in opposition to the Jesus of Pharisaic imagination — 
a miscreant deserving to die for Sabbath-breaking and 
other offences against an artificial religious system. 
He sees in Jesus the realisation of one of the finest 
ideal conceptions in Hebrew prophecy — the Servant of 
God, beloved of God, filled with His Spirit, gentle, 
peaceable, sympathetic, wise, cosmopolitan, capable of 
winning the confidence and satisfying the aspirations 
not of Israelites only but of all mankind. It is the 
retiring non-contentious disposition of Jesus, mani- 
fested in connection with a sabbatic conflict, that re- 
calls the prophetic ideal of Messiah to his mind. The 
baffled foes of Jesus had left the scene of strife in a 
truculent temper, taking counsel "how they might 
destroy Him." Perceiving their threatening mood, 
Jesus withdrew from the place to avoid giving further 
offence and precipitating a crisis. In this procedure 
the Evangelist recognises the Messianic trait : " He 
shall not strive nor cry aloud, neither shall any one 
hear His voice in the streets." But he is not content to 
quote this one sentence : he reproduces the passage in 
full. Instead of a single trait he shows us the com- 
plete picture. It is not a case of loose quotation with- 
out considering whether the quoted matter be relevant 
or irrelevant. Of set purpose he brings in this fair 
portrait of Jesus just here, skilfully using as a foil to 
set off its beauty the hideously distorted ideas of Him 
current in the religious world of Judsea. He takes 
into his hand the sketch of the ancient Hebrew limner, 



8 WITH OPEX FACE 

holds it up to his readers, and says : Look on this pict- 
ure and on that. This is Jesus as I see Him, that is 
Jesus as Pharisees misconceive Him. Which think 
you is the true Jesus? 

How shall we qualify ourselves for judging, what is 
to be the basis for verification ? Must we confine our- 
selves to the immediate context, or may we roam over 
the evangelic narrative from its beginning up to this 
point ? I think the Evangelist himself has the whole 
foregoing story in view, and that that may be the 
reason why he quotes at length and does not restrict 
his citation to the one point apposite to the immediate 
occasion. If so, then we may travel over the preceding 
pages, that by broad, large observation we may satisfy 
ourselves that the prophetic delineation answers to the 
character of Him whose story has thus far been told. 
The very position of the picture in the book — in the 
middle, instead of at the commencement — invites us 
to use the knowledge we have acquired for this pur- 
pose. Another Evangelist, Luke, has also presented 
to his readers an ideal portrait of Jesus, painted in 
prophetic colours. But his picture comes in very early, 
serving as a frontispiece to his book. 1 Matthew's pict- 
ure stands right in the centre, so that we cannot help 
asking, Is the painting like the original as we now 
know Him ? 

Let us then study the goodly image in the light of 
the history going before. " Behold My servant ! " 

The first trait is the Divine complacency resting on 
the person whose character is delineated: " My beloved 

1 Luke iv. 16-30. 



PROPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW 9 

in whom My soul is well pleased." The detested of 
the Pharisees is the beloved of God. A strong thing 
to say ; what evidence of its truth ? The evangelic 
historian points in reply to the baptismal scene at the 
Jordan with the accompanying voice from heaven: 
"Thou My beloved Son." 1 This, of course, would 
have been no evidence for Pharisees who were not 
there to hear, and who would not have believed on the 
report of another that the voice had really been spoken; 
even as there are many now to whom it is no evidence 
because of their unbelief in the miraculous. For minds 
of the Pharisaic type no evidence of any sort could 
avail to show that such an one as Jesus could possibly 
be the well-beloved of God. Such minds judge men 
by external tests and by hard and fast rules, with the 
inevitable result that they often mistake the best for 
the worst, and the worst for the best, and say of one 
who is a true servant and son of God : " Thou hast a 
devil." Happily there is evidence as to the character 
of Jesus available for all men of open, honest heart, 
whether they believe in miracle or not. There is the 
testimony borne by the unsophisticated spiritual in- 
stincts of the soul, which can recognise goodness at 
sight. Can we not see for ourselves, without voices 
from heaven, that Jesus of Nazareth, as revealed in His 
recorded words and acts, is a Son of God, if not in the 
metaphysical sense of theology, at least in the ethical 
sense of possessing a God-like spirit ? Behold My ser- 
vant ! Yea, a servant indeed: of God, of truth, of 
righteousness, of true truth, of real righteousness, with 

1 Matt. iii. 17. 



10 WITH OPEX FACE 

rare capacity for discerning between genuine and coun- 
terfeit — a brave, heroic, prophetic Man, fighting for 
the Divine in an evil time, when godlessness assumed 
its most repulsive and formidable form under the guise 
of a showy, plausible, yet hollow zeal for godliness. 
Truly, in the words of the Hebrew oracle, God had put 
His Spirit upon Him. The descent of the Spirit at 
His baptism, if not an objective fact, was at least a 
happy symbol of the truth. 

The second trait in the picture is the retiring dis- 
position of Jesus, described in the words : * ; He shall 
not strive nor cry aloud, neither shall any one hear 
His voice in the streets." Interpreted in the light of 
the immediate situation these words refer to the peace- 
able spirit of Jesus evinced by His retirement from the 
scene of recent conflict to avoid further contention, 
and the intensification of existing animosities likely to 
result therefrom. But we ma)' give to this part of the 
picture a larger scope, and find exemplifications in por- 
tions of the evangelic history having no direct con- 
nection with Pharisaic antagonism. May not the 
Evangelist have in view here the ascent to the moun- 
tain top and the teaching there given to an inner circle 
of disciples ? The love for retirement among nature's 
solitudes and for the special work of a master instruct- 
ing chosen scholars was characteristic of Jesus. He 
did not indeed shun the crowd or the kind of instruc- 
tion that tells upon, and is appreciated by. the popular 
mind. His voice was heard in the streets, in the syna- 
gogue, from a boat on the lake addressing an immense 
crowd on the shore. He gave Himself with enthusiasm 



PROPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW 11 

to evangelism, visiting in succession all the synagogues 
of Galilee, and never grudging gracious speech to the 
people wherever they might chance to assemble. Still 
this was not the work He preferred, nor was He de- 
ceived as to its value. " Much seed little fruit " was 
His estimate of it in the Parable of the Sower. He 
got weary at times of the crush of crowds, and longed 
for privacy, and made sundry attempts to escape into 
solitude. He felt the passion of all deep natures for 
detachment and isolation — to be alone with God, with 
oneself, with congenial companions capable of receiving 
truths which do not lie on the surface. 

The retirement to the mountain top was one of these 
escapes, and the " Sermon on the Mount," as it has 
been called, shows us the kind of thoughts Jesus gave 
utterance to when His audience was not a street crowd, 
but a band of susceptible more or less prepared hearers. 
"When He had sat down, His disciples came unto Him, 
and He opened His mouth and taught them." 1 His 
first words were the Beatitudes, spoken in tones suited 
to their import — not shouted after the manner of a 
street preacher, but uttered gently, quietly, to a few 
men lying about on the grass, breathing the pure air of 
the uplands, with eyes upturned towards the blue skies, 
and with something of heaven's peace in their hearts. 
In these sayings of the hill we see Jesus at His best, all 
that is within Him finding utterance in the form of 
thoughts concerning citizenship in the kingdom, the 
righteousness of the kingdom, and the grace of the 
Divine King and Father, which are very new in empha- 

1 Matt. v. 1, 2. 



12 WITH OPEN FACE 

sis and felicity of expression, if not altogether new in 
substance. " Why," we are tempted to ask, " should 
one capable of saying such things on mountain tops 
ever go down to the plain below to mingle with the 
ignorant, stupid mob, not to speak of descending lower 
still into unwelcome profitless controversy with prej- 
udiced, conceited, malevolent religionists ? " But such 
a question would reveal ignorance of a very important 
feature in the character of Jesus ; viz., that He was not 
a one-sided man — a mere Rabbi, sage, or philosopher, 
caring only for intimate fellowship with the select few 
— but a man who had also a Saviour-heart, with a 
passion for recovering to God and goodness lost men 
and women, hungering therefore for contact with the 
weak, the ignorant, the sinful ; making the saving of 
such His main occupation, and seeking in the com- 
panionship of disciples only His recreation. 

To this Saviour-aspect of Christ's character the third 
trait points : " A bruised reed shall He not break, and 
smoking flax shall he not quench." Broadly inter- 
preted, these words describe the compassion of Jesus. 
The pathetic emblems denote the objects of that com- 
passion: poor, suffering, sorrow-laden, sinful creatures 
in whom the flame of life temporal or spiritual burnt 
low, and who in body or soul resembled bruised reeds, 
frail at the best, rendered frailer still by grief, pain, 
or moral shortcoming. The pity of Jesus is expressed 
in negative terms. It is declared that He will not do 
what many men are prone to do — crush the weak, blow 
out the flickering flame. The whole truth about Jesus 
is that He habitually did the opposite with reference to 



PROPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW 13 

all forms of weakness represented by the bruised reed 
and the smoking wick. For verification of the state- 
ment we have only to look back over the history. 
Consider, e.g., the ministry of healing. Think of the 
multitudes of sick in Capernaum 2 and elsewhere cured 
of diseases of all sorts — fever, leprosy, palsy, blindness, 
insanity. Miracles or not, these are facts as well at- 
tested as anything in the Gospels. And the subjects of 
these healing acts might very appropriately be described 
as physically or mentally bruised reeds. Take, e.g., 
the man sick of palsy borne of four — what a wreck 
physically ! 2 or the demoniac of Gadara — what a sad 
tragic wreck mentally! 3 Of moral wrecks also there is 
no lack of examples. The palsied man is one ; a wreck 
morally not less than physically, a man in whose life 
vice and disease appear to have been closely intertwined. 
How then did Jesus treat that man ? Did He shun him, 
or blow out the little flame of goodness that might still 
be in him, or utterly crush the spirit of hope that was 
already sorely broken by a hard unfeeling word, or a 
merciless rebuke ? No ! He healed the wounded con- 
science and revived the drooping heart by the gracious 
word cordially spoken : " Courage, child ; thy sins are 
forgiven." Or look in at that large assembly of "pub- 
licans and sinners " in the court of Levi's house in 
Capernaum. 4 Here is a motley collection of bruised 
reeds and smoking wicks of all sorts : social outcasts, 
drunken men, frail women, irreligious, profligate, scan- 
dalous people. What is to be done with them ? Throw 

1 Matt. viii. 16, 17. ' 2 Matt. ix. 1-8. 

3 Matt. viii. 28-34. 4 Matt. ix. 9-13. 



14 WITH OPEN I '.- 

them out into the social refuse heap to rot, or take 
them out in boats and drown them in the lake? Such 
may hare been the secret thoughts of respectable in- 
human people in Capernaum, as such are the thoughts 
of cynical persons now in reference to similar '-hisses of 
our modern society. Not such were the thoughts of 
J< us. Capable of salvation and worth saving even 
the I He. Bruised reeds, yes, but the bruise may 

be healed ; smoking wicks doubtless, but the flame 
may be made to burn clear. Was He too sanguine ? No. 
How strong the reed may become, witness the story 
of Zacehaeus, thoroughly credible, though not told in 
Matthew; 1 how bright the dying flame, witness the 
woman in Simon's bouse with her shower of penitent 
tears, and her alabaster box of precious ointment. 2 
"Much forgiven, much love," was the hopeful creed 
of Jesus. His ideas on this subject were very uncon- 
ventional. Religious people a- lb- saw them appear to 
Him very far from God, and not likely ever to come 
uigh. On the other hand, those whoseemed hopelessly 
given ov<-r to immorality and irreligion \\<- deemed 
not unlikely subjects for the kingdom. The averi 
modern Christian docs not quite understand all this. 
and perhaps ho hopes thai Jesus did not altogether 
meanwhal lb- seems plainly to say. lint lie did iik-.mi 
it, and He, acted upon it, and history has justified His 

belief and policy. 

The Lasl trait in our picture is what maybe called 
the cosmopolitanism, or the universalism, of Jesus. 
••In His name shall the Gentiles hope." Thai is, He 
* Luke xix. 1-10: vide especially <-. H. - Luke vii. 30-60. 



PROPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW L5 

is a Christ not for Jews alone, but for mankind. The 
Hebrew original, as faithfully rendered in fche English 
Bible, means i "The isles shall wait For His law." The 
two renderings coincide in sense in so far as they ex- 
press the universal range of Messiah's functions \ fchey 
differ only in so far as they point to varying aspects of 
His work. The one exhibits Him as a universal object 
of trust, '".''., a universal Saviour; fche other exhibits 
Him as a universal Legislator: fche Saviour of fche 
world, the Lord of the world. Now, let if- be noted, 
Jesus could be neither unless He possessed intrinsic 
fitness for these gigantic tasks. Jt IS not a question 
of "offices" in the, first place, hut of character, cha 
risms, endowments. If- hoots not to tell men that 
Jesus is Christ, and that as such lie exercises fche func- 
tions of prophet, priest, lawgiver, king, so Ion" as they 
do not see that He possesses the gifts and fche grace 
necessary for these high functions. He must have it 
in Him by word, deed, spirit, experience to inspire 
trust, and to make men look to Him \'nv law. i.e., for 
the moral ideal of life. When men are convinced of 
His power in these respects, they will accept Him as 
their Christ; possibly not under fchat name, for some 
fastidious disciples may be inclined to discard the title 
as foreign and antiquated, and un mited for fche vocabu- 
lary of a universal and eternal religion. So be it- ; it 
matters not about fche name (though if- will always have 
its value for theology and fche religious history of fche 
world), the vital matter is what the name signifies. If 
Jesus can be the spiritual physician, and moral guide of 
mankind, He is what fche people of Israel meanl b 



16 WITH OPEN FACE 

Christ, one who satisfies the deepest needs and highest 
hopes of men. And so the great question is, Can the 
Jesus of the Gospels do this ? The question is not to be 
settled by authority, or by apologetic evidences based on 
miracles and prophecies. Trust and moral admiration 
cannot be produced by such means. Orders to trust 
are futile, injunctions under pains and penalties to 
admire vain ; proofs that a certain person ought to be 
trusted and admired inept, unless those to whom the 
commands and arguments are addressed perceive for 
themselves in the person commended the qualities that 
inspire trust and admiration. And if these qualities be 
there, the best thing one can do for his fellow-men is 
to let the object of faith and reverence speak for Him- 
self. Hold up the picture and let men look at it. Set 
it in a good light, hang it well on the wall, remove 
from the canvas obscuring dust and cobwebs if such 
there be ; then stand aside and let men gaze till the 
Friend of sinners, the Man of sorrow, the great 
Teacher, begins to reveal Himself to their souls. 

Jesus has so revealed Himself to multitudes in all 
ages, and of all nationalities ; He continues so to reveal 
Himself to-day. The success or non-success of His 
self-revelation has no connection with race, but only 
with moral affinity. Jesus came first to His own peo- 
ple, and for the most part they received him not. The 
result condemned not Him but them. They had a veil 
of religious prejudice on their face, and they could not 
see Him. It needs an open eye and an open heart to 
see Jesus truly. The open eye and open heart may be 
found in any quarter of the globe ; sometimes in very 



PftOPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW 17 

unlikely quarters : among Barbarians rather than in 
the great centres of culture and civilisation. The 
proud, the vain, the greedy, the slaves of fashion, how- 
ever religious, know nothing about Jesus. Jesus was 
always on the outlook for the open eye and simple, 
open, honest heart, and He was greatly delighted when 
He found them. The classic example of this quest and 
delight is the story of the centurion of Capernaum, a 
Pagan, not a Jew, first-fruit of Gentile faith. 1 What 
beautiful, sublime simplicity in that Roman soldier's 
trust ! And what a thrill of pleasure it gave Jesus ! 
" I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel." 

Not in Israel, the very people for whose benefit the 
Messianic portrait was painted in the olden time. 
Strange that the same people should produce men cap- 
able of such splendid artistic work in the sphere of 
moral delineation, and be so lacking in the power of 
appreciating the historical realisation of the prophetic 
ideals. They devoutly, fanatically believed in the Mes- 
siah in the abstract, but could not recognise Him in the 
concrete. We have to thank Jewish blindness for the 
unearthing of this ancient prophetic picture by a Chris- 
tian historian, by way of protest against hideous carica- 
tures of Jesus by His religious contemporaries. We 
have to thank Jewish unbelief for the tragic result of 
these deplorable misunderstandings, the crucifixion. 
Faith in a Pagan soldier, unbelief in the most religious 
Jews. Faith where you did not look for it, unbelief 
where faith should have been. As it was then, so it is 
still, so probably it always will be. All turns on the 

1 Matt. viii. 5-13. 



18 WITH OPEN FACE 

state of the heart. The pure heart, the unsophisti- 
cated conscience, is implicitly Christian everywhere. 
The men of impure heart, lacking in moral simplicity, 
may be very Christian in profession, fiercely on the 
side of Jesus, yet all the while they are really on the 
side of the Pharisees. 

Wisdom, sympathy, modesty, gentleness, wide-heart- 
edness, combined, such is the Evangelist's conception 
of the Christ, and of Jesus. Surely a most winsome 
Jesus and a most acceptable Messiah ! 

"Behold My servant, whom I uphold,'' so runs the 
oracle in the English version of the Hebrew original. 
Whom I uphold: Jehovah backs His servant, ideal 
Messianic Israel, however despised, against all comers. 
So may we Christians feel in reference to our Lord 
Jesus. We may well uphold Him ; we may with good 
right hold up our heads as believers in Him, as men 
who support a good cause. Comparative religion 
teaches nothing to make us ashamed of Him. The 
only thing we have cause to be ashamed of is our mis- 
erably mean, inadequate presentation of Him in theory, 
and still more in life. Two things are urgently re- 
quired of us modern Christians: to see Jesus truly and 
to show Him just as we see Him. " Behold My ser- 
vant." Try hard to get a fresh sight of Jesus, to 
behold Him "with open face." Then what you have 
seen show with absolute sincerity, not hiding your light 
for fear of men who are religious but not Christian. 
Clear vision, heroic, uncalculating sincerity, how scarce 
in these days of time-serving ! And what power goes 
with them ! Give us a few men whose hearts have 



PROPHETIC PICTURE OF MATTHEW 19 

been kindled with direct heaven-sent insight into the 
wisdom and grace of Christ, and who must speak what 
they know and testify what they have seen, and they 
will bring abont a moral revolution, issuing in a Chris- 
tianised Church and a righteous social state. 



CHAPTER II 

THE REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 

That Mark is the earliest of the first three Gospels 
might be inferred from its comparative brevity, and 
also from the fact that it treats only of the public life 
of our Lord, giving no particulars concerning His birth 
such as we find in Matthew and Luke. But apart from 
these considerations this Gospel contains unmistakable 
internal marks of a relatively early date. These marks 
are such as suggest an eye and ear witness as the source 
of many narratives, and a narrator unembarrassed by 
reverence. This feeling, we know, does come into 
play in biographical delineations of men whose charac- 
ters have become invested with sacredness, and its in- 
fluence grows with time. The high esteem in which 
they are held more or less controls biographers, and 
begets a tendency to leave out humble facts, and tone 
down traits indicative of pronounced individuality, and 
so to construct a story smooth and commonplace in all 
that it reports of word or deed, and exhibiting a char- 
acter free from all peculiarities over which the weakest 
might stumble, and just on that account possessing less 
interest for all who can discern and value originality 
and power. It may seem bold even to hint that any 

20 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 21 

such influence can be traced in any of the evangelic 
memoirs. It would be contrary to fact to say that any 
of them exhibit the characteristics of biographical 
writing arising out of the sense of decorum in a highly 
developed form, though calm investigation may con- 
strain the admission that the rudiments of these are to 
be found in one of them. What I am concerned at 
present to point out is, that wherever such characteris- 
tics may be discovered in the Gospels, they have no 
place in Mark's narratives. If, as we have already seen, 
the presentation of Jesus in the first Gospel is in- 
fluenced by prophecy going before, and if, as we shall 
see, the presentation of Jesus in the third Gospel is to 
a certain extent influenced by reverential faith coming 
after, it may be said with truth of the second that its 
picture of Jesus is not coloured by either of these in- 
fluences. 

Mark is the realist among the Evangelists. It has 
often been observed concerning his style that it is 
graphic, vivid, pictorial. The observation is not only 
not the whole truth, but it is even to some extent mis- 
leading. The epithet " pictorial " suggests the idea of 
an author who employs heightening phrases, and in- 
troduces unimportant particulars simply for effect. So 
used it is a doubtful compliment tending to lower 
rather than increase our respect for a writer. Now the 
thing to be noted about Mark is not the use of height- 
ened or accumulated phrases so much as the avoidance 
of toning down, reticence, generalised expression, or 
euphemistic circumlocution. He states facts as they 
were, when one might be tempted not to state them at 



22 WITH OPEN FACE 

all, or to show them in a subdued light. He describes 
from the life, while Matthew describes from the view- 
point of prophecy, and Luke from the view-point of 
faith. In this respect Mark occupies a place among 
the Gospels somewhat analogous to that of the Vatican 
codex, 1 which differs from all other ancient manuscript 
copies of the Greek New Testament by the measure in 
which it has kept free from modifications of the original 
due to regard for religious edification on the one hand, 
or to literary tastes on the other. The text of the 
Vatican codex has on this account been called " neu- 
tral," to distinguish it from the paraphrasing type of 
text current in the West, and from the refining type 
which had its source in Alexandria. Mark likewise 
may be called " neutral," not, indeed, in the sense in 
which the term has sometimes been applied to him, as 
implying a deliberate attitude of neutrality in refer- 
ence to two conflicting theological tendencies, 2 but in 
the sense that he reproduces the story of Jesus from 
the life, uninfluenced to any appreciable extent either 
by the prophetic interest of the first Evangelist, or by 
the delicate sense of decorum characteristic of the 
third. 

In this neutrality of Mark we have a guarantee of 
first-hand reports and early redaction not to be de- 
spised. The realism of the second Gospel makes for 
its historicity. It is the index of an archaic Gospel. 

1 Referred to in critical editions of the Greek New Testament by the 
letter B. 

2 Such was the view of Dr. Ferdinand Baur and other members of 
the famous Tubingen school. 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 23 

Therefore we may have the less hesitation in making 
this feature prominent by going somewhat into detail. 
I have tried to make an apologetic point of the occa- 
sional weakness of Matthew's prophetic references ; I 
hope now to make an additional point by the exhibition 
of Mark's realistic delineations. 

1. I begin with a biographic hint found only in this 
Gospel concerning the private life of Jesus previous 
to the commencement of His public career. It is con- 
tained in the question of His fellow-townsmen on the 
occasion of His visit to Nazareth, after he had for 
some time carried on His work elsewhere : Is not this 
the Carpenter? 1 This is the one fact we learn from 
the second Evangelist concerning the history of Jesus 
previous to the eventful day when he left Nazareth 
for the scene of the Baptist's ministry. Mark, unlike 
his brother Evangelists, has no account of Jesus' birth, 
and no genealogy proving Him to be a lineal descend- 
ant of David. " A son of the hero-king of Israel," 
say Matthew and Luke; u a carpenter," says Mark, 
with somewhat disenchanting effect. And yet Mark's 
solitary realistic contribution to the early history of 
Jesus is perhaps of more importance to the permanent 
significance of Christianity than the other fact, which, 
while recognising it in his narratives, he takes no 
pains to verify. To make good the title " Son of 
David " as applicable to Jesus Avas an important func- 
tion of the apologetic of the apostolic age, especially 
in a work like that of Matthew probably written for 
the benefit of Jewish Christians. But that title, in 

1 Mark vi. 3. 



24 WITH OPEN FACE 

the literal or physical sense, can hardly be vital to the 
faith of Gentile believers and of all generations. Our 
faith that Jesus is the Christ does not depend on our 
being certain that He was physically descended from 
David. We may satisfy ourselves on independent 
grounds that He meets all our spiritual needs, and 
therefore is a true Christ for humanity. And when 
we have done this, we will have no difficulty in apply- 
ing to Him the prophetic promise of a seed to David, 
at least in a spiritual sense, which in this case, as 
in the case of the Messianic kingdom, might conceiv- 
ably be all the fulfilment the promise was to receive. 
" If ye are Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed," 
argued St. Paul. 1 So we, following the same style of 
reasoning, may say: If Jesus be Christ (shown to be 
such by what He was and did), then was He David's 
seed, ideally at least, if not physically. 

On the other hand, that Jesus, before He began His 
prophetic career, occupied the lowly state of a car- 
penter, is of universal, permanent, and, one may add, 
ever-increasing significance as a symbolic revelation 
of the genius of the Christian religion. It is by no 
means a merely outward, indifferent fact, too trivial 
for mention in even the fullest account of the life of 
so great a Personage. It has distinct and great ethical 
value, both as a biographical fact, and as a means of 
propagating Christian faith. How much that humble, 
yet not ignoble, occupation signifies as an element 
in the education of Jesus ! What possibilities it pro- 
vided of keen insight into the heart of human life, and 

1 Gal. iii. 29. 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 25 

what protection it afforded against the unrealities and 
insincerities attaching to more favoured social condi- 
tions ! Let us not rob it of its significance by remark- 
ing that to learn a trade was a fashion among Jews 
irrespective of rank. The artisan experience of Jesus 
was more than a fashion complied with ; it was a 
social necessity endured. Jesus was a real, not an 
amateur, carpenter, the difference being as great as 
between a volunteer soldier and one who engages in 
actual fighting. Then what a power lies in this one 
fact, Jesus a carpenter, to enlist for Him the inter- 
est of the million ! The toiling multitude in every 
land and in every age can say : He is one of ourselves. 
He knows us, and we know Him and trust Him. He 
fought a good fight for us, for man stripped of adven- 
titious distinction ; all honour to His name. It was 
well for all reasons that the Founder of a universal 
religion came up out of the humbler social levels with 
guaranteed sympathy for the many. And it is well 
that the fact has been distinctly stated in at least one 
Gospel, for "faith cometh by hearing." 

2. Our next example of Mark's realism shall be 
taken from his account of "The Temptation. " ''The 
Spirit driveth Him into the wilderness." 1 Note the 
word driveth, much the strongest to be found in any 
of the accounts. It points to a powerful force at 
work, of some kind. And we can have no doubt as 
to its nature. Of course it was not a physical force 
exerted to compel a reluctant person to go whither he 
would not, into the inhospitable regions of a stony 

i Mark i. 12. 



26 WITH OPEN FACE 

desert, where " wild beasts " were the only available 
companions. The force of the Spirit, as the Evangel- 
ist conceives the matter, is brought to bear inwardly, 
and acts through thought and feeling. In other 
words, the driving implies and denotes intense mental 
preoccupation. Jesus is thinking earnestly, passion- 
ately, of His new vocation and of the future it will 
bring, and instinctively, inevitably, as if under an 
irresistible impulse, He retires into the solitudes of 
Nature congenial to one in so absorbed a mood. What 
a flash of light this one realistic word "driveth" 
throws on the spiritual endowment and disposition of 
Jesus ! A deep thinker, with a profoundly earnest, 
passionate temper, and a spirit capable of single- 
hearted, consuming devotion to a great end : this is 
what we see by aid of this momentary illumination. 
And the knowledge we have gained is not confined to 
the particular experience to which the word is applied. 
It gives the key to the whole life in all its leading 
phases ; therefore to those that already lie behind. 
It explains the departure from Nazareth, and the bap- 
tism in the Jordan. It helps us to understand why, 
and in what mood, Jesus left the home of His child- 
hood and early youth, and the place and instruments 
of toil. The Spirit was driving Him then and there 
also ; for we must on no account conceive the Spirit 
as coming upon Him for the first time after His bap- 
tism. The descent of the Spirit recorded by all the 
Evangelists is rather the objective symbol of an ante- 
cedent subjective fact, an inner possession reaching far 
back into the past years, and at last culminating in the 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 27 

resolve to make that eventful journey southwards. 
The resolutions of deep, strong natures are not formed 
suddenly. They are the ripe fruit of early dreams, 
and lengthened brooding, and much wistful solitary 
thought. But when the crisis comes, purposes are 
formed with intense decision, and promptly carried 
into effect. Then the driving, tempestuous action of 
the spirit begins, when men called to great careers act 
in a way that surprises all who do not know what 
silent processes of preparation have gone before. So 
it was with Jesus when He left Nazareth ; so when He 
demanded baptism ; so when He retired into the wil- 
derness. These were three consecutive scenes in the 
first act of the great drama which terminated on Cal- 
vary. Jesus passed through all three by Divine con- 
straint. He must leave Nazareth, He must be baptised, 
He must bury Himself amid the grim retreats of the 
wilderness, to master there the abstruse problem of His 
new vocation, that He may enter on its duties with 
clear vision, confirmed will, and pure, devoted heart. 

3. A third example of Mark's manner may be found 
in his account of the first appearance of Jesus in the 
synagogue of Capernaum. 1 Jesus now appears actually 
engaged in the work of His high calling, and that ac- 
count gives a vivid idea of the impression He made 
immediately upon the people. He did two things on 
that occasion. He preached, and He cured a man 
suffering from a disease described as possession by an 
unclean spirit. By both functions He created astonish- 
ment, significantly reflected in the comments of those 

i Mark i. 21. 



28 WITH OPEN FACE 

present, as reproduced in the life-like report of the 
Evangelist. "What is this? " said they to each other, 
" What is this ? A new teaching ! With authority 
He commandeth even the unclean spirits, and they 
obey Him." 1 They were astonished at the immediate 
cure of the demoniac by an authoritative word, and this 
is not surprising ; but not at that alone. They were 
not less astonished at the novel kind of preaching, 
which ordinary readers of the Gospel, I suspect, fail 
sufficiently to realise. And yet the Evangelist does 
his best to direct our attention to the fact by an obser- 
vation brought in at an earlier stage in his narrative. 2 
In that observation he points out the remarkable feat- 
ure in Christ's preaching. It was the note of author- 
ity, he explains, that took the hearers by surprise. 
Authority, commanding power in word and deed : 
that was what struck the worshippers in Jesus as He 
appeared before them that Sabbath day. And yet 
they had been accustomed to authority in doctrine. 
They were constantly hearing in the synagogue of 
what had been said by the ancients. 3 Their Rabbis 
or scribes were never done quoting the opinions of 
those who sat in Moses' seat, and interpreted the mean- 
ing of the law. But there was a wide difference be- 
tween this new Rabbi and all the rest. The Evangelist 
remarks on it : " Not as the scribes," and we may take 
for granted that it had struck the people in the syna- 

1 v. 27, as in the Revised Version, which is based on a different 
reading in the Greek from that to which the Authorised Version cor- 
responds, according to which the wonder referred only to the act of 
healing. 

2 v. 22. 3 Matt. v. 21. 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 29 

gogue. Jesus spake not by authority, like the scribes, 
citing the names of renowned doctors, but with author- 
ity — " as one that had authority." He quoted no 
opinions of others ; He simply uttered His own 
thoughts, and so uttered them that they came home 
to the minds of listeners with swift, sure effect, pro- 
ducing conviction, admiration, and sudden thrills of 
pleasure and awe. All this we learn from the simple 
words, "a new teaching ! " reported by Mark as uttered 
on the spot. Peter was present. Papias, a Church 
Father, living about the beginning of the second cen- 
tury, tells us that that apostle was the source from 
whom Mark derived his information. It looks like 
it here. That lively exclamation : " a new teach- 
ing ! " sounds like the report of one who had been 
there, and on whom the spontaneous expression of 
popular admiration had made an indelible impression. 
4. A curious and at first puzzling instance of Mark's 
realism is supplied in his account of what may be 
called the Flight of Jems from Capernaum. The story 
he tells is this : — 

" And in the morning, a great while before daj^, He rose up 
and went out, and departed into a desert place, and there prayed. 
And Simon and they that were with Him followed after Him : 
and they found Him, and say unto Him, All are seeking Thee. 
And He saith unto them, Let us go elsewhere into the next towns, 
that I may preach there also, for to this end came I forth." * 

" To this end came I forth," i.e., from Capernaum 
early that morning. Luke gives the matter a different 
turn. He makes no mention of a flight at an early 

1 Mark i. 35-38, from the Revised Version. 



30 WITH OPEN FACE 

hour, and he changes the apology for flight into a 
statement by Jesus as to the aim of His mission in 
general. 1 We must not, in the well-meaning but 
somewhat officious spirit of the harmonists, force the 
second Evangelist to say the same thing as the third. 
Mark's version is historical, not theological ; and if 
we will take it so, we shall get clearer insight into the 
spirit of Jesus, and the situation in which He was 
then placed. We assume then that what Jesus said 
to Peter and the others was that He had left Caper- 
naum in order that He might preach in other towns. 
From this we learn that Jesus had formed a plan for 
a preaching tour in Galilee, and that the appearance 
in the synagogue of Capernaum on the previous day 
was simply the beginning of its execution. Having 
delivered His message there, He desires to visit other 
Galilean synagogues, that He may speak in them 
words of similar import. That we now fully under- 
stand to be His earnest, deliberate purpose. But why 
such haste, and why such secrecy ? Why not stay a 
little longer in Capernaum, where His words and works 
are so greatly appreciated, say another week ; and why 
not leave, when He does leave, in open day ? There 
must be urgent reasons for the haste and the secrecy. 
The reason for the secrecy is obvious. All were seek- 
ing Him. The people of Capernaum had not had 
enough of Him, either of His preaching or of His 
healing power, and they would do their utmost to 
prevent His going ; therefore He stole away while 
they were asleep. But what was the reason of the 

1 Luke iv. 42, 43. 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 31 

haste f It must be found in that which constitutes 
the penalty of sudden and great popularity — the 
jealousy, envy, and ill-will of those whose vanity or 
interest is compromised thereby. Jesus taught not 
as the scribes. The scribes knew that as well as the 
people, and even if no comparisons were made by 
other hearers, they themselves, such of them as were 
in the audience, would carefully note the difference, 
and find in it a source of annoyance. Jesus instinc- 
tively apprehended danger, and took His measures 
accordingly. Being earnestly minded to preach in 
other synagogues, He hasted away, fearing that His 
opportunity might soon be cut off. He could not 
speak in the synagogues without the consent of the 
officials, and who could tell how soon and how far 
the incipient dislike of the scribes in Capernaum 
might spread, proving a barrier in His way wherever 
He went. Therefore He said to Himself : " I must 
go at once on this preaching mission, that I may 
speak in as many synagogues as possible, before there 
has been time for opposition to be organised." 

Here was a complicated, perplexing situation : im- 
mense popularity on the one hand ; ill-will in the 
professional heart, likely ere long to develop into 
overt action, on the other. We are not surprised to 
learn that Jesus spent part of that morning in prayer. 
He did not pray as a matter of course in pursuance of 
a habit, engaging as it were in His wonted morning 
devotions. The prayer was special, in reference to 
an urgent occasion ; and though no particulars are 
mentioned, we can easily imagine its purport. The 



82 WITH OPEN FACE 

emergency suggested petitions such as these : that 
the people in the various places He meant to visit 
might lend Him a willing ear ; that opportunity might 
not be too soon cut off by the plotting of evil-minded 
men ; that He might be able to speak the word of the 
kingdom sweetly and graciously, unruffled in spirit 
by opposition experienced or apprehended ; that im- 
pressions made on friendly hearers might not run 
into a merely superficial enthusiasm, or degenerate 
into an interest having its root in a desire for ma- 
terial benefit. How luminous and instructive that 
puzzling realistic anecdote of Mark's has at length 
grown ! 

5. Our next instance is the remarkable statement 
peculiar to the second Gospel that the relatives of 
Jesus at a certain period said of Him : " He is beside 
Himself." 1 The passage is somewhat obscure partly 
owing to its brevity, and as a Catholic commentator 
long ago remarked, 2 it is rendered more difficult than 
it really is by a piety that will not let itself believe 
that any one could think of Jesus as seems to be 
reported. But it is best to look the unpleasant fact 
fairly in the face in hope that it will bring to view 
some new and notable features in the picture of Jesus. 

One thing the fact stated very evidently bears wit- 
ness to : the moral originality of Jesus. The thought 
of His relatives simply exemplifies the incapacity of 
the ordinary man to understand the extraordinary 
man. Unusual force of mind, or depth of conviction 
or sincerity in utterance, anything out of the common 
1 Mark iii. 21. 2 Maldonatus. 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 33 

course in conception or in conduct, is a mystery or 
even an offence to the average man. It would be 
his wisdom to stand in silent awe, hat in hand so to 
speak, before the mystery, as unscientific persons 
would stand in the presence of a mysterious phe- 
nomenon in the physical universe. But men will 
talk about their moral superiors, they will have their 
opinions and theories about them, and they have 
little hesitation in uttering these, however disrespect- 
ful or injurious. And so it came to pass that even 
the friends of Jesus thought and said that He was 
out of His senses, thereby bearing involuntary testi- 
mony to the exceptional greatness of His personality. 
The rude speech of these stupid friends testifies 
further to the enthusiasm of Christ's humanity. It 
was while He was so busily occupied with His usual 
work among the people, preaching and healing, that 
He could not find time to take food that the friends 
arrived on the scene, and, watching His behaviour, 
came to their sapient conclusion. Much benevolence, 
they thought, had made Him mad, and in their good- 
ness they desired to rescue Him from the crowd and 
the excitement, and take Him home to quietness and 
rest. Let us pardon their stupidity for the sake of 
their most reliable testimony to the intensity of 
Christ's devotion to His beneficent toil. The mad- 
ness was only in their imagination, but the benevo- 
lence was a great indubitable fact. Here also He 
was driven by the Spirit. A sacred passion for doing 
good to others was one of the outstanding characteris- 
tics of Jesus ; that is what we learn in an emphatic 



34 WITH OPEN FACE 

manner from this new instance of Mark's blunt way 
of telling his story. 

From this same instance we may learn further the 
extensive and extraordinary character of the healing 
ministry of Jesus. It was so obtrusive a fact that 
men found it necessary to invent theories to account 
for it. The friends of Jesus had their theory; look- 
ing on while He taught and healed, they said to one 
another, He is suffering from a disordered mind. 
Theirs was not the only theory broached ; King 
Herod had his likewise. When he heard of the fame 
of Jesus as a Healer, he said : It is John the Baptist 
risen from the dead — just come back to earth from 
the spirit- world and wielding its mysterious powers. 1 
And the scribes and Pharisees had their theory, es- 
pecially with reference to the cure of demoniacs ; 
Mark places it side by side with that of the friends 
as if inviting us to compare the two. He casteth 
out devils, said they, by the prince of devils. 2 Very 
unsatisfactory theories all three; the first stupid, the 
second grotesque, the third malicious and dishonest. 
Never mind. They all serve an important purpose, 
that of showing that the healing ministry was a 
great fact. Men do not theorise about nothing. 
When theories arise, something has occurred that 
arrests attention and demands explanation. 

Before passing from this instance it is due to Mark 

to say that he has supplied materials which enable us 

to see how utterly unfounded was the judgment of the 

"friends." It is not to be denied that incessant ex- 

1 Mark vi. 14. 2 Mark iii. 22. 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 35 

citing work among the " masses," especially such as 
makes heavy demands on sympathy, brings dangers 
both to bodily and to mental health. There is need 
not only for intervals of rest, but for occupations 
and interests of a different order to help the mind 
to maintain its balance, and to keep the spirit in per- 
petual calm. That these were not wanting in the 
case of Jesus clearly appears in Mark's narrative. 
Just before he has shown Jesus occupied with the 
formation of a disciple-circle, first selecting from the 
great crowd a larger group of susceptible spirits with 
whom He retires to the mountain top, and thereafter 
by a gradual process choosing from these a smaller 
circle of twelve. 1 With these chosen companions He 
remains up there for some time communicating to 
them such deep wise thoughts as those preserved in 
Matthew's Sermon on the Mount. This might be made 
clearer to the ordinary reader by a different verse-divi- 
sion and a slightly amended translation, the words 
" And He cometh into a house " 2 being made an in- 
dependent verse, and the phrase "into a house" being 
replaced by the one word "home." The narrative will 
then stand thus, — 

v. 19, "And Judas Iscariot, which also betrayed Him" (the 
close of the disciple-list). 

v. 20, " And He cometh home." 

v. 21, " And the multitude cometh together again so that they 
could not so much as eat bread." 

By leaving a blank space between v. 19 and v. 20 
we convey the impression of a considerable interval 
1 Mark iii. 13, 14. 2 Mark iii. 19. 



36 WITH OPEN FACE 

between the ascent of the mountain (y. 13) and the 
return to the plain, or the coming home, which of itself 
implies absence for an appreciable time. The blank is 
the place at which Mark's report of the Teaching on 
the Hill would have come in had it entered into his 
plan to record it. 

6. Yet another instance of Mark's realistic style 
must be briefly noticed. It is the tableau of Jesus on 
the way to Jerusalem, and the final crisis, presented in 
these words : — 

" And they were in the way, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus 
was going before them, and they were amazed, and they that fol- 
lowed were afraid." 1 

Again the same intensity which had filled " friends " 
with astonishment and alarm. Once more, driven by 
the Spirit ! But this time the subject which engrosses 
the thoughts of Jesus is not His beneficent work among 
the people but his own approaching passion. Walking 
in advance of the twelve and the larger crowd who fol- 
lowed in the rear, He is as solitary in spirit as He is 
isolated on the ascending path. Emotions agitate His 
soul in which His fellow-travellers have no part. The 
inward mood reveals itself in His outward bearing in 
such a way as to inspire in spectators wonder and fear. 
How much was in his mind at that hour: the holy sup- 
per, the farewell words, Gethsemane, the cross, all there 
by vivid anticipation ! And how much in His manner 
as it met the eye : a tragic mood, a hero's air, the step 
of one going forward to battle! He told the twelve 

i Mark x. 32. 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 37 

what He was thinking of, but it was not necessary; 
they saw it all and were filled with awe. And we see 
it through the Evangelist's vivid, rapid portraiture, in 
which gesture is made to tell the tale of unspeakable 
pathos, firm resolve, heroic daring, faithfulness even 
unto death. 

The foregoing are samples of realistic touches pecul- 
iar to Mark, and their number might easily be in- 
creased. There are others equally significant in which 
he does not stand alone, Matthew having introduced 
them into his narrative probably from the pages of his 
brother Evangelist. Among these may be named the 
realistic description of the process of digestion in the 
discourse concerning that which defileth, 1 the discour- 
aging word to the Syrophenician woman, It is not meet 
to take the children's bread and cast it to the dogs, 2 
and the stern word to Peter, Get thee behind me, 
Satan, 3 all omitted by Luke, to which may be added in 
the sphere of action the realistic description of the 
cleansing of the temple. 4 If any one desires to know 
what is meant hj realism, let him compare with Mark's 
account of that transaction the mild, mitigated report 
of it given by the third Evangelist. I content myself 
with a bare reference to these instances, and close with 
an illustration of Mark's manner taken from the sphere 
of doctrine. 

7. Mark's account of the teaching of our Lord is, 
by comparison with that in the other Gospels, very 
meagre. Yet it is remarkable that two of the most 

1 Mark vii. 19. 2 Mark vii. 27- 

3 Mark viii. 33. A - Mark xi. 15-18. 



38 WITH OPEN FACE 

characteristic utterances of Jesus have been preserved 
by him alone. These are the saying concerning the 
Sabbath being made for man, 1 and the parable of the 
Blade, the Grreen Ear, and the Ripe Corn. 2 The former 
admirably illustrates the comment on Christ's manner 
of teaching, "not as the scribes." The saying, the 
Sabbath exists for man not man for the Sabbath, is 
diametrically opposed to the scribal method of teach- 
ing in religious tendency and spirit. In effect their 
doctrine was precisely that man existed for the Sab- 
bath. Originally given, as Jesus hinted in the first 
part of His saying, for man's benefit, as a resting day 
for weary men, a day of emancipation from toil and 
drudgery, they had converted it into a day taken from 
man by God in ail exacting spirit, and so established 
in connection with it a new form of bondage — slavish 
subjection to an institution. A boon turned into a 
tyranny — such was the Sabbath as enforced by 
the scribes ; a tyranny restored to a boon — such it 
became through the redemptive word of Jesus. That 
word was equally opposed to the scribal method of 
teaching in manner. No authorities cited, no Rabbi 
referred to as the first to utter so bold a thought. 
Jesus speaks in His own name, and on His own author- 
ity ; a grave word on a vital question, incisive, deci- 
sive, final. Once more that word presents a complete 
contrast to the teaching of the scribes in its ethical 
character. The scribal mind moved within the region 
of positive rules, the more minute and unreasonable 
the better ; the thoughts of Jesus spurned these nar- 
1 Mark ii. 27. 2 Mark iv. 26-29. 



REALISTIC PICTURE OF MARK 39 

row limits, and were conversant with great moral prin- 
ciples and ultimate truths in religion. No better 
voucher for this statement could be offered than the 
saying in which He stated the true relation between 
the Sabbath and man. 

Equally remarkable is the parable of the Blade, the 
Green Ear, and the Ripe Corn. It states in distinct 
terms the law of growth or gradual development as a 
law obtaining in the spiritual world not less than in 
the natural. It is the most precise, indeed I may say 
the only precise, enunciation of that law, as reigning 
in the spiritual sphere, to be found in the New Testa- 
ment. Some have doubted the genuineness of the 
parable, regarding it as a secondary form of some 
other parabolic utterance of Jesus. Surely a ground- 
less doubt! Who but Jesus could have spoken so 
felicitous and so philosophical a word ? Not one man 
known to us in the apostolic age, not even the Apostle 
Paul. Indeed so far is the great Master above the 
attainments of the primitive Church in this part of His 
teaching that one is thankful the parable has been pre- 
served at all, even in a single Gospel. The same re- 
mark applies to the saying concerning the Sabbath. 
Both utterances were, if I may say so, too deep and 
too thorough-going for the comprehension and sym- 
pathies of average disciples. And it is just on this 
account that I think they may legitimately be used 
to illustrate the realism of Mark. He reports, as they 
were spoken, these striking words, when the tempta- 
tion was either to omit or to qualify. He did this doubt- 
less on the authority of one who heard them as they 



40 WITH OPEN FACE 

fell from the lips of the Master, and who, though he 
might not understand or fully appreciate, could never 
forget. 

These two invaluable words are a welcome contribu- 
tion in a Gospel in which Jesus appears chiefly as an 
energetic original actor. They show that the force 
of His intellect was equal to the force of His will. 
They also prove that the impassioned temperament 
was balanced by a deep imperturbable tranquillity of 
spirit; for such great, universal, eternal thoughts visit 
only minds blessed with perennial repose. 



CHAPTER III 

THE IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 

Luke is the only one of the synoptical 1 Evangelists 
who takes his readers into his confidence as to the 
aim and plan which gnided him in writing his Gospel. 
From the statement which he makes in the opening 
sentence of his work, the following inferences may be 
drawn : 

1. That he lived late in the day, after many attempts 
had alread}^ been made to give an account more or less 
complete of the public ministry of Jesus. 

2. That he had not himself been an eye-witness of 
any part of that ministry, or even had an opportunity 
of hearing particulars concerning it from any of the 
men who "had been with Jesus." 

3. That his sources of information were mainly books, 
written accounts, memoirs of the life of Jesus. 

4. That in writing his Gospel he earnestly en- 
deavoured to make a careful, judicious use of these 
sources. 

5. That his aim in writing was to confirm faith in 
the evangelic tradition in the mind of the friend whose 

1 This term is applied to the first three Gospels to denote that they 
are so like one another in contents and style that they may and ought 
to be studied together. 

41 



42 WITH OPEX FACE 

benefit he had chiefly in view: in his own words, "that 
thou mightest know the certainty of those things 
wherein thou hast been instructed." 

Luke, we see, had the spirit of research, and desired 
to base his narrative on the sure ground of historic 
fact. 

It is quite compatible with this that the Evangelist 
should be to a certain extent controlled in the con- 
struction of his story by his own religious feelings, or 
by the religious feelings of the time in which he lived, 
or by the spiritual state of his first readers, whether we 
include in that category merely the one person named, 
Theophilus, or a circle in which he was the prominent 
figure. He might have to consider what they were 
likely to be interested in, what they could understand, 
what they could bear, and his own tastes and sympathies 
might be very much like theirs. 

Compared with the first two Gospels, the third 
presents characteristics which answer to this hypotheti- 
cal state of matters. A large number of particulars 
can be collected from its pages which, taken together, 
convey the impression of a story told under the in- 
fluence of certain preconceived ideas or predilections. 
They are too many to be accidental, and too marked 
to be the result of the unconscious action of the stream 
of tradition rolling evangelic incidents down its course, 
and polishing them into smoothness as it carried them 
along. One cannot help feeling that there must have 
been intention at work, at some point, either in our 
Evangelist, or in those who prepared the sources from 
which he drew his information. 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 43 

The features of the narrative which most plainly 
bear traces of editorial discretion with a view to edi- 
fication relate to the person and character of our Lord 
and also of His apostles. The writer seems never to 
forget the present position of those of whom he has 
occasion to speak, as the Risen Lord of the Church, 
and its earthly Heads. The frequent use of the title 
" Lord " and " Apostles " where the other two Evange- 
lists say "Jesus," and "Disciples" at once exemplifies 
and symbolises the reverential attitude. To that at- 
titude it is probably further due that some things 
related in Matthew and Mark are omitted, some 
things strongly emphasised, some things set in a sub- 
dued light, and, finally, some things introduced for 
the first time into the evangelic story: all making for 
one end, giving prominence to certain aspects of the 
Saviour's career and character that strongly appeal to 
faith and love, and throwing into the shade others 
making severer demands on the power of appreciation. 
In the sections of the narrative relating to the disciples 
the apparent tendency is to gentle handling of their 
weaknesses, while letting it be seen that the weak- 
nesses were there. 

It is in view of such characteristics as those above 
referred to that I apply the epithet " idealised " to the 
picture of Jesus presented in the Third Gospel. The 
term needs to be guarded against possible misappre- 
hension. It might suggest the idea of a narrative 
dominated by a theological idea, or by a controversial 
tendency, say a keen interest in a universal, Gentile, 
Pauline Christianity. Such a bias has indeed been 



44 WITH OPEN FACE 

ascribed to Luke, but dispassionate investigation finds 
little trace of it. The Evangelist is doubtless Pauline 
and universalist in his attitude, and it gives him 
pleasure to record words and acts of Jesus going to 
prove that He had the Gentiles in view as ultimate 
participants in the blessings of His gospel. But his 
interest in such elements of the evangelic tradition is 
religious, not controversial, and even as such it is by 
no means keen, absorbing, predominant. If he had 
been a controversial Paulinist, as imagined by the 
famous Tubingen school, he would have taken pains to 
let the Twelve appear in as unfavourable a light as pos- 
sible, whereas the fact is he " ever spares " them. If 
he had been a keen universalist, he would have reported 
certain words of our Lord pointing in that direction, 
given both in Matthew and in Mark, which he never- 
theless omits. 1 When therefore the picture of Jesus 
given by Luke is described as " idealised," the meaning 
is that his presentation is dominated, not by theo- 
logical ideas or controversial tendency, but by religious 
sentiment having its root either in the personal idiosyn- 
crasy of the writer, or in considerate regard to the edi- 
fication of his first readers. 

The character of Christ had heights and depths fitted 
to test severely the powers of comprehension not merely 
of crude disciples, but even of experienced, mature 
Apostles and Evangelists. Two ways of dealing with 
the harder sayings and doings are conceivable. An 
Evangelist might relate all he knew as it happened, 

1 E.g., the remarkable word in Matthew xxvi. 13, Mark xiv. 9: 
" Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in all the world," etc. 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 45 

and leave his story to make its own impression, loyally 
trusting that the character described, even though it 
should be in some respects above his own comprehen- 
sion, would eventually in its every feature commend it- 
self to the minds and consciences of all believers. Or 
he might, so to speak, take the character of Jesus in 
charge, and allow nothing to appear which was " over 
the head" of the reporter, or which he feared might 
prove a stumbling-block to those whose religious bene- 
fit he had primarily in view in writing. Which of 
these two ways of discharging the Evangelist's very re- 
sponsible function is the wiser, it is needless to discuss ; 
perhaps both are justifiable in given circumstances. 
Anyhow, the fact is that Mark (and Matthew also) has 
chosen the former way, and Luke, so far as one can 
judge, the latter. At all events, the phenomena of his 
Gospel are such as fit into that hypothesis. There are 
many facts bearing that complexion, however they are 
to be explained. I shall exhibit them with some meas- 
ure of fulness, believing that in this case also a fear- 
less discussion will be found to make for the historicity 
of the evangelic tradition. And for the more complete 
inductive verification of Luke's method, I shall briefly 
note also some instances of his discreet manner of deal- 
ing with materials relating to the disciples, though not 
they, but their Master be our theme. It may be best 
to dispose of these first. 

Luke, it has been said by a very reverent commen- 
tator, 1 "ever spares the Twelve." As a matter of fact 
his narratives, compared with those of Matthew and 
1 Schanz, a Catholic professor in Tubingen. 



46 WITH OPEN FACE 

Mark, uniformly treat the disciples with considerate 
gentleness. How true this is, cannot be adequately 
shown by a cursory reference to illustrative instances ; 
the passages must be carefully perused and compared 
with the parallels in the other Gospels. Yet even the 
hastiest glance will suffice to make a prima facie im- 
pression in the direction of our thesis. 

Take then, to begin with, the treatment of Peter. 
The stern word, " Get thee behind me, Satan," is 
omitted. But most characteristic is the manner in 
which the most humiliating event in Peter's disciple 
life, his denial of his Lord, is dealt with. The pre- 
intimation of the coming fall is most gently handled. 
The harshness of the announcement, " thou shalt deny 
me thrice," is softened by a prefatory statement, in 
which by an allusion to Satan Peter's case is virtu- 
ally placed beside that of Job, and the experience is 
likened to a sifting process whereby a saintly charac- 
ter will be purged of its weak, chaff-like elements, 
the result of all to be that the sifted man shall be- 
come the strongest man of the apostolic band, having 
it for his honourable vocation to succour weaker 
brethren. 1 And what a benignant under-statement is 
the account of the denial ! Xo mention of cursing 
and swearing. The three denials form an anti-climax, 
each succeeding one weaker than the one going be- 
fore. In the first, Peter denies all knowledge of 
Jesus; in the second, only intimate knowledge, dis- 
cipleship ; and the last, occurring an hour later than 
the one preceding, is rather an evasion than a denial : 

i Luke xxii. 31, 32. 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 47 

A Galilean, say you ? Yes, I am, and I don't under- 
stand what you are saying. 1 

The whole body of the Twelve are treated with 
equal consideration. Their faults — ignorance, weak 
faith, mutual rivalries — while acknowledged in loy- 
alty to truth, are touched with a very sparing hand. 
Some narratives in which these appear in a glaring 
manner are conspicuous by their absence. To the 
omitted incidents belong the conversation concerning 
the leaven of the Pharisees, in which, as Mark reports 
it, Jesus complains of the hardness of their hearts, 
and asks reproachfully, Do not ye yet understand? 2 
the ambitious request of the two sons of Zebedee, in 
which the discord within the disciple-circle appears 
in its most acute form, 3 and the anointing in Beth- 
any, in which the Twelve show a prosaic incapacity 
to appreciate the pathetic, poetic deed of Mary. 4 To 
be noted also in this connection is Luke's silence con- 
cerning the flight of the disciples at the apprehension 
of their Master. Even more instructive than this 
silence is the mild, delicate way in which the faults 
of the future Apostles are dealt with by the Evange- 
list when he is compelled to speak of them. Take, 
e.g., their weak faith. In the storm on the lake, on 
the eastward voyage towards Gerasa, as reported by 
Matthew and Mark, Jesus characterises the behaviour 
of His disciples as cowardly, and as exhibiting a lack 

1 Luke xxii. 55-62 ; compare with Mark xiv. 66-72. 

2 Mark viii. 11-21 ; for another strong reflection on the ignorance 
of the disciples, vide chap. vii. 18. 

3 Mark x. 35-45 ; Matt. xx. 20-28. 

4 Mark xiv. 3-9 ; Matt. xxvi. 6-13. 



48 WITH OPEN FACE 

of faith. 1 In Luke's report, with just the slightest 
accent of reproach in His tone, He asks, " Where is 
your faith ? '* 2 Again, at the foot of the hill of Trans- 
figuration, the disciples, in Matthew, ask, Why could 
not we cast it out? and receive for reply, Because 
of your little faith ; the Master going on to indicate 
what mighty deeds could be wrought by the smallest 
grain of faith, as if to insinuate that they had none 
at all. 3 This conversation, connected with the case of 
the epileptic boy, Luke omits. The saying concerning 
faith as a grain of mustard seed he does report, but 
in a characteristically different setting. The Apos- 
tles say unto their Lord, Increase our faith ; and He 
replies, "If (as is the case) ye have faith as a grain 
of mustard seed, ye would say unto this sycamore tree, 
Be thou rooted up and be thou planted in the sea, and 
it would have obeyed you," 4 the implied assertion be- 
ing that the}^ have already enough to achieve marvels. 
Note again how the Evangelist disposes of the rivalry 
among the companions of Jesus. He selects as the 
place for mentioning it the story of the Last Supper 
on the eve of the Passion. Truly a most unseemly 
time for disciples to indulge in ambitious passions ! 
How then is the outbreak dealt with ? Jesus first 
utters the words of admonition which, according to 
Matthew and Mark, He spoke on the occasion when 
James and John made their ambitious request. Then 
He goes on immediately after to pronounce a gener- 
ous eulogy on the contending disciples : " Ye are they 

1 Matt. viii. 26 ; Mark iv. 40. 2 Luke viii. 25. 

3 Matt. xvii. 19, 20. 4 Luke xvii. 5, 6. 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 49 

which have continued with Me in My temptations " : 2 
so, as it were, dwarfing into insignificance the petty 
fault of temper in comparison with the heroic fidel- 
ity. Just one point more I barely mention here : 
Luke's apology for the failure of the disciples to 
keep awake when their Master was in Gethsemane. 
" Sleeping for sorrow ! " 2 Doubtless the fact was so, 
but he is careful to note it. How true it is that he 
ever spares the Twelve ! 

But it is with Luke's portraiture of our Lord that 
we are mainly concerned ; I proceed, therefore, to in- 
dicate some of the things in his Gospel which lend 
distinctiveness to his picture. 

1. Among these fall to be mentioned some notable 
omissions, more especially some of the more remark- 
able words reported by the other Evangelists as hav- 
ing been spoken by Jesus. Some have been referred 
to already in a previous chapter, such as the realistic 
word concerning that which defileth, 3 the seemingly 
harsh word about " dogs " spoken to the woman of 
Canaan, 4 and the stern rebuke administered to Peter : 
"Get thee behind me, Satan." Another very notice- 
able omission is the saying concerning eunuchism for 
the Kingdom of Heaven, for which we are indebted to 
Matthew. 5 Still more remarkable is the omission of 
the awf ul cry of Jesus on the cross : " My God, My 
God ! " 6 In some respects the most surprising omis- 
sion of all is the very important word spoken by 

1 Luke xxii. 28. 2 Luke xxii. 45. 

3 Matt. xv. 17, 18 ; Mark vii. 18, 19. 4 Matt. xv. 26 ; Mark vii. 27. 

Matt. xix. 12. 6 Matt, xxvii. 40 ; Mark xv. 34. 



50 WITH OPEN FACE 

Jesus on the occasion of the ambitious request of 
James and John : " The Son of man came not to be 
ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life 
a ransom for many/' 1 What gives this omission spe- 
cial claims on our attention is the fact that it seems 
on first view one of those words which, assuming his 
acquaintance with it, Luke would have taken pains 
to preserve. Its omission is a problem to be solved 
in connection with his Gospel. But this is only a 
part of the problem. This particular saying is one 
of four containing Christ's teaching concerning the 
significance of His death, all of which, with one very 
doubtful exception, are wanting in the Third Gospel. 
This is a fact the reason and meaning of which de- 
serve careful consideration, and they will be con- 
sidered in a future chapter. 2 Meantime I simply note 
this as one of the peculiarities of Luke, and pass on 
to a second class of phenomena which make this Evan- 
gelist's picture of Jesus so distinctive. 

2. The things which are strongly emphasised. First, 
let it be remarked in general that there are such phe- 
nomena in the Third Gospel. Luke does not always 
tone down and deal in mitigated statements. He can 
be as emphatic and realistic as either of his brother 
Evangelists when it suits his purpose, and this very 
occasional emphasis gives added significance to the 
opposite quality of subdued expression observable in 
some of his narratives. Among the instances in which 
he does not shrink from strong sayings are his reports 
of w-ords spoken by our Lord in reference to wealth 
1 Matt. xx. 28 ; Mark x. 45. 2 Vide chap. xii. 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 51 

and its possessors. The hard saying concerning the 
camei and the needle's eye finds a place in his pages. 1 
It is in his Gospel we find the woes pronounced on the 
rich, the full, and the merry. 2 In the parables of the 
Unjust Steward and Dives 3 riches almost seem to be in 
themselves evil, and the bare fact of possessing them 
appears to be represented as a ground of perdition. It 
may be only an appearance, but it is there, requiring 
explanation ; and the thing to be noted is that the 
Evangelist takes no pains in this case to prevent misap- 
prehension. The fact may be due in part to the nature 
of his own social sympathies, partly to his knowing 
that there was no risk of any of his readers stumbling 
over such sayings of the Lord. 

Luke emphasises whatever tends to bring out into 
strong relief the power, the benevolence, and the saintli- 
ness of Jesus. His desire to make prominent the two 
former of these attributes is apparent in his narratives 
of healing acts. Peter's mother-in-law is ill of a great 
fever, 4 and the leper is full of leprosy, 5 and in the story 
of the blind man at Jericho care is taken to make it 
appear a case of total blindness by representing the suf- 
ferer as needing some one to conduct him to the pres- 
ence of Jesus. 6 There is no good ground for regarding 
these statements as exaggerations, but it is legitimate 
to see in them a wish to make the cure effected stand 
out in the full measure of its marvellousness. The 
greatness of the benefit conferred, that is the benevo- 

1 Luke xviii. 24. ' 2 Luke vi. 24, 25. 

3 Luke xvi. 4 Luke iv. 38. 

5 Luke v. 12. 6 Luke xviii. 40. 



52 WITH OPEN FACE 

lence of the Healer, is also rendered prominent by 
many a slight but significant touch. The withered 
hand restored on a Sabbath is the right 1 hand, most 
useful for labour ; the centurion's servant is one dear 
to him ; 2 the son of the widow of Nain is an only son, 3 
and the daughter of Jairus an only daughter ; 4 the 
epileptic boy at the foot of the hill of Transfiguration 
is also an only child. 5 

The holiness of the Lord Jesus is carefully accentu- 
ated in this Gospel. The call of Peter to discipleship, 
which here assumes larger proportions and greater 
significance than it possesses in Matthew and Mark, is 
made to contribute to this end. Here Peter is the 
great disciple, the representative man among the 
Twelve, therefore his call is related with much circum- 
stantiality, while that of the others, James, John, and 
Andrew, is thrown into the shade. Yet even he, the 
pillar- Apostle of future years, in view of the marvel- 
lous take of fishes, exclaims, " Depart from me, for I 
am a sinful man, O Lord." The foremost of the dis- 
ciples feels himself unworthy to join the society of 
the Holy One. 6 

In every saintly character prayer, a devotional spirit, 
forms a prominent feature. This trait in the character 
of the Lord Jesus is accordingly made very prominent 
in Luke's Gospel. After the healing of the leper Jesus 
withdraws into lonely spots to pray. 7 The teaching on 
the hill is inaugurated by a night spent in prayer. 8 

1 Luke vi. 6. 2 Luke vii. 2. 3 Luke vii. 12. 

4 Luke viii. 42. 5 Luke ix. 38. e Luke v. 8. 

7 Luke v. 16. 8 Luke vi. 12. 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 53 

Prayer formed the prelude to the momentous communi- 
cations on the Messiahship and the approaching Pas- 
sion ; 1 likewise to the mysterious Transfiguration 
scene. 2 Sometimes the Master prayed alone, sometimes 
in the presence of His disciples. Hearing Him pray in 
a certain place awoke in them a desire for instruction 
in an art in which they felt the Master left them far 
behind. 3 He prayed for them as well as in their hear- 
ing ; for Peter, for example, when the hour of his trial 
was nigh. 4 

3. I pass now to the category of understatement, things 
presented in a subdued light. Both words and acts of 
Jesus fall to be noticed here. To the former belong 
the words spoken at Capernaum in reference to the dis- 
cussion that had arisen within the disciple-circle on the 
question : Who is the greatest ? According to the re- 
port of Matthew, the Master then spoke two very stern 
words, one directly addressed to the disciples, the other 
bearing on the doom due to the man who, in the pur- 
suit of ambitious ends, should cause any little one to 
stumble. In the former disciples are threatened with 
exclusion from the kingdom unless their disposition 
undergo a change, and ambitious passions give place to 
a childlike spirit. In the latter it is intimated that the 
fate deserved by the offender of the little ones is that a 
large millstone (literally one driven by an ass, as op- 
posed to a small one worked by the hand) be hanged 
about his neck, and that he be drowned in the deepest 
part of the sea. 5 Words, both, expressive of passionate 

1 Luke ix. 18. 2 Luke ix. 29. 8 Luke xi. 1. 

4 Luke xxii. 32. 5 Matt, xviii. 3, 6. 



54 WITH OPEN FACE 

abhorrence of selfish ambition and the mischief it works, 
by the utterance of which Jesus commands our admira- 
tion and inspires in our hearts holy awe. But Luke 
has dealt with these solemn sajdngs in a way which 
prevents them from having their full effect, toning 
down the millstone saying so that it loses its note of 
indignant intensity, 1 and transferring the other to a 
different occasion, where it loses the personal reference 
to the disciples, and becomes a general declaration as 
to the necessity of childlikeness for admission into the 
Kingdom of Heaven. The new setting is furnished by 
the incident of the mothers bringing their little chil- 
dren to be blessed by Jesus, 2 which, I may remark in 
passing, supplies a fresh instance of Luke's habit of 
sparing the Twelve. Mark tells that Jesus was much 
displeased with His disciples for trying to keep the 
children from His presence. 3 Of this the third Evan- 
gelist says nothing. The omission has the same effect 
as the toning down of the words under consideration. 
Both keep the indignation of Jesus out of view, and 
suggest the idea of one who was always calm in temper 
and passionlessly didactic in speech. Whether this 
passionlessness entered into the Evangelist's own idea 
of sanctity, or whether in so reporting the Lord's 
words he was considering what his readers could bear, 
it may be difficult to determine. What is certain is 

1 Luke xvii. 2: The ass-millstone becomes a millstone simply, and 
''the sea" stands in place of "the depth of the sea." Luke gives 
neither of the sayings in connection with the Capernaum discourse on 
humility. Vide chap. ix. 46-48. 

2 Luke xviii. 15-17. 

3 Mark x. 14. 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 55 

that the character of Jesus thus portrayed gains in 
amiability at the cost of its power and majesty. 

A similar observation is suggested by Luke's treat- 
ment of our Lord's anti-Pharisaic protest. Two facts 
have to be noticed here : extensive omission, and a new 
setting given to much that is retained. As to the 
former, so much has been left out that from Luke's 
Gospel alone it would be quite impossible to obtain any 
adequate idea of the viciousness of Pharisaic religion, 
or of the thoroughness and exhaustiveness of the criti- 
cism which Jesus directed against it. In proof of this 
statement it will suffice to mention the omission of the 
great body of the Sermon on the Mount, consisting of 
an elaborate contrast between righteousness as con- 
ceived by the scribes and the righteousness of the king- 
dom as conceived by the Preacher, and also of one-half 
of the great final philippic against Pharisaism as 
recorded in Matthew xxiii. But it is the setting of 
what is retained that at present concerns us. It strikes 
me as most characteristic and instructive. The fact 
here is that much of what Luke reports of our Lord's 
anti-Pharisaic discourses appears in his Gospel as 
spoken not merely about Pharisees but to them by Jesus 
sitting as a guest at their tables. On three distinct 
occasions Jesus appears in his pages as a guest in the 
houses of Pharisees, and speaks His mind about their 
ways with urbanity though also with freedom. 1 Of 
such semi-friendly social relations there is no trace in 
Matthew and Mark, and we might easily take away 
from their narratives the impression that such relations 
1 Luke vii. 36-50, xi. 37-52, xiv. 1-24. 



56 WITH OPEN FACE 

were impossible. That might be a hasty inference. 
It may be taken for granted that Jesus would not re- 
fuse such invitations, and that He would be true to 
Himself wherever He was. On the other hand, it is 
equally certain that His attitude towards Pharisaism 
was uncompromising, and His speech about it, especially 
at the end, crushing and tremendous. And the thing 
to be noted about Luke is that he mitigates the severity 
of the sterner utterances by giving as table-talk what 
in Matthew's Gospel appears as part of a solemn final 
protest in Jerusalem against the religious guides of 
Israel and all their ways. 1 

The chief instances of pruned statement concerning 
the actions of Jesus are the narratives of the Cleansing 
of the Temple and the Agony in the Garden. The 
latter will fall to be considered at a later stage of these 
studies; therefore for the present I content myself with 
a few words on the former. Of the three synoptical 
Evangelists, Mark describes the scene in the strongest 
colours, but both Matthew and he tell the story in 
substantially the same way. In both Jesus not merely 
speaks in a tone of indignant remonstrance, but acts 
with a stormy energy that might easily be mistaken for 
violence, overturning the tables of the money-changers 
and the seats of them that sold the doves. He makes 
a clean sweep of the unholy traffic within the sacred 
precincts, unceremoniously turning out not merely those 
that sold but also those that bought as art and part in 
the work of desecration. Of this animated transaction, 
Luke offers a very reduced and unsensational account, 

1 Vide in chap. xi. 37 ff, 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 57 

telling how Jesus, entering the temple, began to cast 
out them that sold, making no mention of the over- 
turned tables and seats, adding only the complaint: It 
is written, And My house shall be a house of prayer, 
but ye have made it a den of robbers. 1 His report 
gives really no idea of the scene ; the one vivid feature 
is the comparison of the desecrated temple to a robber's 
den. And yet from that strong utterance one might 
suspect that there was something behind left unsaid. 
It seems to be a half-told tale, as if adapted to the capac- 
ities of spiritual minors, who would find it difficult to 
reconcile the strenuous conduct of Jesus with their 
preconceived ideas of His character. Probably what 
interested Luke himself was not the drastic action of 
the Lord Jesus, but the verdict He pronounced on the 
Holy House as no longer holy, justifying beforehand 
that still more drastic action of Providence by which 
the temple, at the time he wrote, had been turned into 
a heap of ruins. Whatever the reason, the fact is that 
in this case, as in others, the third Evangelist presents 
a picture of Jesus which lacks the element of tragic 
grandeMr. 

4. For this defect Luke amply compensates by the 
attractive exhibition which he makes of the grace of 
Jesus, especially in the additions he contributes to the 
common stock of evangelic traditions. 

Luke's additions, though not exclusively, are pre- 
dominantly, such as serve this valuable purpose. They 

1 Luke xix. 45, 46: the words "them that bought" have no place 
in the best MS. copies of the Greek Testament, and are omitted in the 
Revised Version. 



58 WITH OPEN FACE 

may for the most part be described by the happy phrase 
he employs to indicate the character of Christ's address 
in the synagogue of Nazareth: " words of grace." 1 
He had evidently taken pains to collect material of 
this kind. There is no reason to doubt the historicity 
of his collections. The statement in his preface justi- 
fies the assumption that for every one of his narratives 
he had a voucher in oral or in written tradition. Then 
there is intrinsic probability on the side of his peculiar 
contributions. Love to the sinful and the social out- 
casts was unquestionably a most outstanding charism of 
Jesus. Most authentic sayings of His, such as " I came 
not to call the righteous, but sinners," and " The Son 
of man came to seek and to save that which was lost," 
entitle us to look for illustrative anecdotes in the 
memorabilia of His public ministry. Instead of ques- 
tioning the truth of those Luke has preserved, we 
rather wonder at the paucity of such material in the 
companion Gospels. We feel sure that interesting 
stories of the relations of Jesus with the sinful, and of 
His sayings about them, might be forthcoming, if pains 
were taken to collect them. Luke happily has taken 
pains, possibly in part because he noticed a lack in 
Matthew or in Mark, and felt he must set himself to 
supply it. What he has given by way of supplement 
is very welcome as well as very credible. The story 
of the woman in Simon's house 2 is pure evangelic gold. 
So are the exquisite parables concerning the joy of 
finding things lost. 3 The same grace-revealing charac- 

1 Luke iv. 22. 2 Luke vii. 36-50. 

3 Luke xv. 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 59 

ter belongs to the parables of the Good Samaritan, 1 the 
Great Supper, 2 and the Pharisee and the Publican. 3 
They foster the saving instinct, and hold out hope to 
those who need to be succoured and saved. The last- 
named is described as a parable concerning those who 
trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and 
despised others. Its aim is to condemn not merely the 
self-complacency, but more especially the contempt, and 
to encourage the despised by letting them know that 
they were at least not beyond the sympathies of God. 
The winsome stories of Zacchseus 4 and the penitent 
thief 5 worthily crown a collection of gleanings which 
fully justify the encomium on Luke's Gospel that it is 
"the Gospel of the sinful." 

Little needs to be added by way of summarising the 
results of the foregoing discussion. The particulars 
under the four heads of omissions, emphasised state- 
ments, under-statements, and additions, all conspire to 
one end, viz., to exhibit the Lord of the Church divine 
in Power, Holiness, and Goodness. The holiness of 
Jesus is so zealously guarded that He appears not only 
without sin but even free from all that bears the most 
remote resemblance to moral infirmity in temper, word, 
or action. The result is that the natural individuality 
of Jesus, so conspicuous in Mark, is seen in Luke only 
in faded outline. Luke's picture of Jesus is one-sided. 
The side shown is indeed so attractive that we thank 
the Evangelist for what he has given rather than blame 
him for what he has withheld. Yet we ought distinctly 

1 Luke x. 25-37. 2 Luke xiv. 15-24. 3 Luke xviii. 0-14. 

4 Luke xix. 1-10. & Luke xxiii. 39-43. 



SO WITH OPEN FACE 

to see. and acknowledge to ourselves, that his presenta- 
tion is defective. We cannot accept as complete a 
Christ who is siniply good and kind. We need a 
Christ who can be angry, indignant, terrible in passion- 
ate abhorrence of evil : who can hurl thunder-bolts of 
denunciation at the "unwedgeable and gnarled oak" of 

^erful. privileged, and plausible iniquity. The love 
: Jesus :: :he sinful, as it appears in this Gospel, is 
itiful: but the hatred of Pharisaism which is some- 
what thrown into the background is equally indispen- 
sable. So likewise is the stern purpose, at all costs, :: 
purge out of the disciples evil elements of temper 
which, left unchecked, would soon turn the new society 
of which they were to form the nucleus into a com- 
munity little better in spirit than that in which the 
scril es i: sway. VTho that considers to what extent 
Christianity has been wrecked by priestly assumption 
can regret that the evangelic records have so faithfully 
sh ; wn how contrary that leaven was to the mind of the 
Lord Jesus 

The view I have ventured to present of Luke's treat- 
ment of the evangelic tradition, in so far as it concerns 
the persons of Jesus and His disciples, can be turned to 
some account for apologetic purposes. It makes for the 
historicity of the Svnoptical records. The remark ap- 
plies even to Luke's omissions. These at first view 
seem :: _::st a dark shadow of doubt on the historical 
value of the material omitted. We are inclined : 
argue: if Luke had known these things, he would have 
:hem ; and how could a man who took such 
pains to inform hini-r-: fail to know them if they had 



IDEALISED PICTURE OF LUKE 61 

been actual facts ? When the element of intention is 
introduced, this reasoning falls to the ground. We 
then perceive that there were classes of facts which the 
Evangelist would not care to preserve. Things not 
known, therefore presumably not real, become things 
probably known which the Evangelist did not choose 
to introduce into his narrative. At the very least, in- 
tentional omission, once established, cancels all presump- 
tion against historicity. On the other hand, abridged 
or qualified reporting bears positive evidence to the 
reality of the fact reported. Whatever a writer tones 
down he is tempted to omit. In adopting the course 
of understating rather than omitting he becomes, so 
to speak, a reluctant witness to the historicity of the 
materials so dealt with. Finally, even heightened state- 
ments in their own way contribute to the cumulative 
apologetic argument. If the added elements be the 
result of fuller information, this is self-evident. Even 
if they be exaggerations for a purpose, they tend to 
establish the truth of the basal narrative. They show 
within what narrow limits editorial discretion was 
willing to restrict itself. An author who has ideas to 
embody is tempted to invent when he cannot find. 
Luke did not invent, but only at most touched up 
stories given to his hand by a reliable tradition. This 
is his method in narratives common to his Gospel with 
those of Matthew and Mark. Noting this, we can well 
believe it to have been his method all through, even 
in those portions of his Gospel where he is our sole 
authority. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 

The first thing the average reader of the Gospels 
has to do in reference to this department of our 
Lord's work is to get it fairly into his mind that 
there was such a thing as a systematic synagogue 
ministry. With the exception of the narratives relat- 
ing to visits made to the two synagogues of Caper- 
naum and Nazareth, the Gospels contain only general 
statements, such as that in Mark i. 39 : " He preached 
in their synagogues throughout all Galilee, and cast 
out devils." 2 Such summary notices, giving no de- 
tails, make little impression on the mind. You read 
the words, pass on, and the fact briefly stated takes 
no place in your permanent conception of Christ's 
evangelistic activities. Even when we pause to reflect 
for a moment on what these general statements say, 
we are apt to think that they are not to be taken in 
earnest, as pointing to a deliberately planned, per- 
sistent, extensive effort to bring to the ears of the 
men of Galilee, through the convenient medium of 
the synagogue, the good news of the Kingdom of God. 
The clearest evidence that this is a mistaken view 

1 Vide also in Matthew iv. 23. 
62 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 63 

is contained in Mark i. 38, where Jesus is represented 
as giving such a preconceived plan as His reason for 
leaving Capernaum. " Let us go into the next towns, 
that I may preach there also ; for therefore came I 
forth." He has addressed a Sabbath audience in one 
synagogue, and He desires to do the same elsewhere. 
The manner of His departure lends emphasis to the 
purpose. It was hasty, because He feared that the 
time of His Galilean ministry might be cut short, 
and His preaching mission interrupted, by the enmity 
of the scribes. A synagogue ministry, as distinct 
from a street ministry, depended on the good-will of 
others, and Jesus understood that it must begin at 
once if it was to be at all. The departure was secret, 
before the dawn, while men slept, because He feared 
detention by a people valuing His presence for the 
healing power displayed on so splendid a scale on 
the previous Sabbath evening. Evidently Jesus is 
very much in earnest about that preaching tour. It 
is not an afterthought, or a pretext, but a fixed pur- 
pose ; one of the main lines along which He means 
to conduct His work as the Light of Galilee. The 
prayer with which He ushered in the day on the 
eventful morning of that flight from Capernaum shows 
the same thing. In the life of Jesus, protracted soli- 
tary prayer was ever the prelude of important under- 
takings. 

The plan was a large one. "In their synagogues 
throughout all Galilee " : that meant many sermons. 
In the time of our Lord there were many towns in 
that province large enough to have at least one syn- 



64 WITH OPEN FACE 

agogue. Josephus gives the number at 204, the 
smallest of them having 15,000 inhabitants. 1 Even 
supposing, with many modern scholars, that there is 
some mistake or exaggeration in the statement, it 
witnesses indubitably to a very thickly-peopled coun- 
try. What a time it would take to go over all these 
towns, even if advantage were taken of the week-day 
meetings on Mondays and Fridays, as well as of the 
more solemn assemblies for worship on the Sabbaths. 
The scheme would assume more manageable dimen- 
sions if the purpose was to visit chiefly the smaller 
towns. This is suggested by the Greek phrase for 
which the English equivalent in the Authorised Ver- 
sion is "next towns," the literal meaning being the 
next wZZa^e-towns. 2 It is not improbable that Jesus, 
knowing that a selection must be made, resolved to 
visit, in the first place, the lesser centres of popula- 
tion, having possibly only a single synagogue. He 
might be led to adopt this course by various con- 
siderations : His deep yearning to preach the gospel 
to the poor, the likelihood of greater receptivity to 
His message among villagers, the hope that much 
good work might thus be done quietly, with smaller 
risk of attracting the sinister attention of the relig- 
ious authorities. 

How far did Jesus succeed in carrying out His 
beneficent plan? The expression "all Galilee," used 
by the Evangelists, would seem to point to complete 
execution. But perhaps we ought not to press the 

1 Vide his Vita, chap. xlv.,and B. J., iii. 3, 2. 
- els ras ixo^vas KU/xoiroXeis (Ma?'k i. 38). 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 65 

"all," but take the fact to be that a very consider- 
able number of places were visited in succession so 
as to justify such a colloquial exaggeration. This 
speaks to an interval of months between the time of 
Christ's departure from Capernaum to that of His 
return. From Mark ii. 1 indeed we might infer that 
the period consisted of only a few days. But a 
slightly altered grouping of the words does away 
with that impression. Instead of the rendering in 
the Authorised Version: "And again He entered 
into Capernaum after some days, and it was noised 
that He was in the house," we may substitute : " And 
He entered again into Capernaum, and after some 
days the report went abroad : He is home." The 
situation is easily conceivable. Jesus returns almost 
as quietly as He went away. He is some days in 
the town before they know. But when they know, 
what lively interest in the fact ! The memory of 
events now some months old revives : the marvellous 
address in the synagogue, followed by an equally mar- 
vellous cure ; the marvels of the day crowned and 
eclipsed by the wholesale healing ministry of the even- 
ing. They say to one another : the great Preacher 
and Healer is back among us again. " He is home." 
Yes ! home and welcome to most, but not to all. 
The situation is altered somewhat. The scribes are 
on the alert. So when the crowd gathers around the 
newly returned Master, some of them are present to 
watch what goes on. And when a poor paralysed 
man, physically and morally a wreck, is brought to be 
healed, and Jesus, going to the root of the evil and 



66 WITH OPEN FACE 

aiming at reviving the smoking wick of hope in the 
poor sufferer's breast, says in cordial tones : "Courage, 
child ! thy sins are forgiven," the scribes, by look if 
not by audible word, say : " Why does this person 
thus speak ? he blasphemeth." Here at last is the 
mischief Jesus instinctively feared from the first, the 
well-grounded dread making Him anxious to start on 
the preaching tour as quickly as possible, in hope to 
get over a considerable amount of ground before the 
latent antagonism began to reveal itself in active at- 
tempts at frustration. What if such attempts have 
brought Him back to Capernaum sooner than He 
otherwise would have come ? What if secret corre- 
spondence between the scribes of Capernaum and the 
rulers of synagogues in other towns have resulted in 
closed doors, opportunities of speech refused, a bene- 
ficent plan broken off half executed? It is not un- 
likely. Reading between the lines, we get this as a 
not improbable version of the story : Jesus meant to 
evangelise all Galilee, and He did actually preach in 
not a few synagogues, but ecclesiastical wire-pulling 
interrupted His work ; the scribes compelled Him to 
return prematurely home, and they were there to 
watch Him on His return. 

Concerning the synagogue ministry, we have, as 
already indicated, little definite information. Yet we 
are not so entirely in the dark as to its nature as we 
might at first imagine. We know the general features 
of that ministry, the estimates formed of it by the peo- 
ple and by the Evangelists, and at least the text of one 
of the addresses. 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 67 

1. The general features were preaching, teaching, and 
healing according to Matthew, preaching and casting out 
devils according to Mark. By preaching, as distinct 
from teaching, may be understood the proclamation of 
the elementary truths concerning the Kingdom of God 
as a kingdom of grace : the paternal love of God, the 
hope that is in His mercy for the most sinful, the worth 
of man to God even at the worst, the duty of repen- 
tance, and the possibilities of sanctity for the penitent. 
By teaching, on the other hand, is denoted instruction 
in the theory, so to speak, of the kingdom: its absolute 
worth, its imperial claims, its moral ideal in itself and 
in contrast to current conceptions. From the nature 
of the case, and from the omission by Mark of any 
separate mention of teaching, it is probable that preach- 
ing was the staple element in our Lord's synagogue 
discourses. Teaching was for disciples, preaching for 
the people. That healing acts were a frequent accom- 
paniment of the preaching goes without saying. For 
even if Jesus did not start on His Galilean mission 
with a set purpose to heal, He was always willing to 
give succour on demand. And as disease is every- 
where, and the desire for healing is not less universal, 
it may be taken for granted that there were few of the 
village towns where something similar to the incident 
in the Capernaum synagogue did not happen: demonia- 
cal possession or some other human ailment cured by 
the Preacher to the astonishment of all. The story of 
Christ's visit to the synagogue in Capernaum may be 
taken as a sample of what occurred all over Galilee. 
One exception indeed is specified, and it may be viewed 



68 WITH OPEN FACE 

as an exception which proves the rule. Jesus, it is 
recorded, did no mighty work in Nazareth; 1 not for 
want of sick people, nor for want of power, but because 
the villagers would not give Hirn the chance. They 
were so chagrined at a fellow-townsman being so dis- 
tinguished that they would rather let their diseased 
relatives die than give Him an opportunity of showing 
His greatness. So far can prejudice go. 2 

2. The reported estimates of the synagogue ministry 
are various. That of the people, as is their way, was 
merely emotional, an expression of honest and intense 
admiration : What is this ? A new teaching ! and an 
unheard-of kind of power ! That of the Evangelists 
gives us some insight into the quality of the preaching 
which immediately created popular surprise. Mark 
uses the method of comparison : He taught not as the 
scribes — they by authority citing Rabbis of reputation 
in support of their dogmas ; He with authority, citing 
nobody, speaking out the intuitions of the soul, and 
leaving these to commend themselves to the minds of 
ingenuous hearers. Luke comes nearest to the heart of 
the matter when he employs the expression "words 
of grace " to characterise the utterance of Christ in the 
synagogue of Nazareth. I believe we shall not go far 
wrong if we take that phrase as applicable not merely 
to that particular discourse, but to the synagogue dis- 
courses generally, and view it as referring not chiefly 

1 Mark vi. 5. 

2 Euthymius Zigabenus, a Greek monk of the tenth century, author 
of a fine commentary on the Gospels, remarks : "It was not for Jesus 
to benefit them against their will " (oik e5et fiialus evepyereTp ai/rovs). 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 69 

to graceful diction, but rather to gracious thought, — 
to matter rather than to manner. Gracious thought 
concerning the loving-kindness of God, sweetly and 
winsomely spoken, that in Nazareth and everywhere 
was the burden of Christ's synagogue sermons. Not 
that the Preacher is a man of one idea. He has many 
thoughts about the Kingdom, some of them deep and 
abtruse, fit only for the disciplined ear of the few, some 
of them severe and exacting, some of them stern in 
their bearing on the teaching and practice of the scribes 
and Pharisees ; all of which He utters on due occasion. 
But the grace of God is His favourite theme. The 
Gospel of Divine love runs like a sweet melody through 
the rich, varied, sublime harmonies of His religious 
teaching. That God is good, that He is a Father, that 
He shows His good-will to all in manifold ways in His 
ordinary providence ; that He careth for the weak, the 
lowly, and even the low ; that in Him is plenteous 
redemption, even for those whom men despair of : such 
were the things He delighted to say, said to all He met, 
and wished to say once at least in the hearing of all to 
whom he could gain access. Therefore, while there 
was doubtless endless variety in the colouring and 
contents of His synagogue addresses, there would be a 
certain pervading similarity, perhaps some ideas delib- 
erately repeated in unvarying forms of language ; for 
all great teachers who have some very decided message 
to deliver are apt to repeat themselves, not in helpless- 
ness, but because they cannot satisfy themselves with- 
out saying, and saying again and again. 

3. The text of the address in the synagogue of Naza- 



70 WITH OPEN FACE 

reth beginning, " The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me," 
happily preserved by Luke, supplied the best possible 
key-note for such gracious discourse. That it is histor- 
ical I doubt not, but it is also typical. It is the kind of 
text Jesus would choose for a popular sermon. The 
Scripture He was to preach from might not always be 
in His power. He might oftenest have to take His 
theme from the fixed lesson for the day in the Law or in 
the Prophets. Nothing, however, could come wrong to 
Him, for He knew His Bible intimately, and had some 
deep spiritual thought in His mind associated with 
every important passage, which He could utter in fit- 
ting language on the spur of the moment. Think, for 
example, what He brought out impromptu from the 
superficially unpromising words : " I am the God of 
Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of 
Jacob." 1 From the greater number of Old Testament 
texts, whether selected by Himself or given to His 
hand, He would have no difficulty in eliciting the veri- 
table Gospel of the Kingdom under one or another of 
its aspects by most legitimate exegesis. For no one 
knows till he has examined into the matter how much 
that is truly evangelic in spirit is to be found in the 
Hebrew Scriptures : in Genesis, in Deuteronomy, in 
the Psalter, and in the Prophets ; how much that is in 
full sympathy with the splendid text from Isaiah which 
formed the theme of the Nazareth discourse concerning 
the anointing of Messiah to preach good tidings to the 
meek and to bind up the broken-hearted. One of the 
causes of admiration in our Lord's synagogue audiences 

1 Matt. xxii. 32 ; Mark xii. 27 ; Luke xx. 38. 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 71 

would be the ease and naturalness with which He drew 
from familiar words precious truths which they had 
never seen there before, turning what had appeared 
"flint into a fountain of waters." x And when the word 
even to the popular view was manifestly not flint but 
fountain, another cause of admiration would be the 
happy manner in which, as if by a spell, He cleared 
the fountain of polluting, choking matter, so that its 
waters appeared pellucid as crystal, inviting the thirsty 
to drink from a pure well of salvation. " Let us make 
man in our image " ; " I have surely seen the affliction 
of ]Vfy people which are in Egypt " ; " The earth is full 
of the goodness of the Lord " ; " With Him is plente- 
ous redemption " ; " Thou, O Lord, art our Father " ; 
" In Thee the fatherless findeth mercy " ; " Is Ephraim 
my dear son ? is he a pleasant child ? for since I spake 
against him I do earnestly remember him still " ; "I 
will put My law in their inward parts" — what thrill- 
ing, gracious, unforgettable words Jesus could speak 
on such texts, making the hearts of His hearers burn as 
He talked to them on the Sabbath days ! The syna- 
gogue teaching of the scribes was dry-as-dust even 
when they stumbled on oracles like these, but that was 
their fault, not the fault of the sacred words. It was 
their unhappy way to choke all the wells with the rub- 
bish of Rabbinical theology, and part of Christ's mis- 
sion was to remove the rubbish, and restore the intuition 
of the perennial sense of the Holy Writings. 

More of the words and deeds of Jesus than we know 
may really have belonged originally to the synagogue 

1 Ps. cxiv. 8. 



72 WITH OPEX FACE 

ministry, though the connection is not indicated in the 
evangelic records. Some have tried to construct an in- 
augural synagogue discourse out of materials now form- 
ing part of Matthew's Sermon on the Mount, piecing 
together, e.g., the counsel against care, the lesson on 
prayer, the warning against judging, the law of reci- 
procity, and the closing parable of the wise and foolish 
builders, and offering the composition as a sample of 
what Jesus was likely to say in a concio ad popxdum. 1 
This is purely conjectural, and not very probable con- 
jecture either ; for what we have been accustomed to 
call the Sermon on the Mount is in all probability rather 
a summary of disciple-teaching on various topics carried 
on perhaps for a week, during a season of retreat on 
the mountain plateau overlooking the Galilean lake. 
We have something more to support the supposition 
that certain parables in the evangelic collections, and 
some also of the recorded miracles had their primary 
place in the synagogue ministry. Luke gives the 
parables of the Grain of Mustard Seed and the Leaven 
as pendants to a s} T nagogue incident, 2 suggesting the 
inference that they were spoken in a synagogue dis- 
course. They happily illustrate a truth not too recon- 
dite for popular apprehension : that great things may 
grow out of very insignificant beginnings ; and by their 
simplicity and brevity are well fitted for preaching to 
the million. The same remark applies to another pair 
of parables, the Hidden Treasure and the Precious 
Pearl. 3 The one pair would aptly clinch the moral of 

1 So Keim in his well-known work on the Life of Jesns. 

2 Luke xiii. 18-21. 3 Matt. xiii. 31-33. 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 73 

an address whose import was : despise not the kingdom 
I bring nigh to you because it seems a small, humble 
thing ; the other with equal felicity would enforce the 
lesson : count the kingdom the chief good, joyfully 
secure it at all costs. That Jesus did use similitudes 
in these popular addresses may be taken for granted. 
" Without a parable spake He not unto them," observes 
Mark, with reference to our Lord's manner of speaking 
to the multitude. 1 How could He fail to employ that 
method of instruction, having personally such a taste 
and talent for it, speaking to people accustomed to it, 
and knowing full well the power of the parables to 
entertain, to lodge truth permanently in the mind, and 
to make the meaning clear ? To make the meaning 
clear, I say, for undoubtedly that was the real aim of 
the parabolic method, not, as one might hastily infer 
from certain words reported by Mark as spoken by 
Jesus in connection with the Parable of the Sower, to 
hide truth from the eyes of the people, and tickle their 
ears with words to which they attached no rational 
sense. 2 Of such an inhuman purpose Jesus was 
(need it be said ?) utterly incapable. 

Two miracles certainly, and one most probably, 
belong to the synagogue ministry. The first of the 
three is the cure of the demoniac in the synagogue of 
Capernaum, reported by Mark and Luke ; 3 the second 
is the cure of the woman who had a spirit of infirmity 
eighteen years, reported by Luke only, 4 and the third 
is the cure of the leper, reported by all the three 

1 Mark iv. 34. 2 Mark iv. 12. 

3 Mark i. 21-28 ; Luke iv. 31-37. 4 Luke xiii. 10-13. 



74 WITH OPEN FACE 

Evangelists. 1 Mark brings it in immediately after 
his general statement concerning the preaching of 
Jesus in the synagogues of Galilee, and the inference 
is natural that it owes its place to its being regarded 
by the Evangelist as an anecdote of that ministry. In 
point of varied interest the last-mentioned healing act 
eclipses the other two, especially as reported by Mark, 
whose version of the leper-story is a good instance of 
his realism. Common to all the three narratives is 
the leper's " If Thou wilt, Thou canst," and Christ's 
peremptory injunction to the healed man, " Go, show 
thyself to the priest." Both features are interesting: 
the former as showing how completely even at this 
early period faith in Christ's poiver to heal any form 
of disease had taken hold of the popular mind, and 
how the more difficult faith in His loving ivill lagged 
behind ; the latter as evincing a desire on Christ's part 
at once to make the benefit complete by adding to the 
physical cure social restoration, and to act in a respect- 
ful, conciliatory spirit towards existing institutions 
and established authority. That recognition of the 
priest's place and function gains added meaning if, as 
I have supposed, Jesus already feared the interference 
of the scribes. It assumes in that case the aspect of a 
policy of conciliation adopted in the interest of the mis- 
sion, in hope to make a favourable impression on syna- 
gogue magnates and retain their good-will as long as 
possible. 

To these common elements of the story Mark adds 
the compassion of Jesus, and the assumption after the 
1 Matt. viii. 2-4 ; Mark i. 40-45 ; Luke v. 12-16. 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 75 

cure of an imperative, threatening manner to insure 
that the healed man shall go away at once and report 
himself to the priest, instead of remaining content 
with merely being whole. The addition of these traits 
is not an affair of mere word-painting. Both are 
valuable contributions to a vivid reproduction of the 
situation as observed by an eye-witness. Christ's com- 
passion was a very noticeable feature to an impression- 
able onlooker like Peter, and one cannot wonder that 
he laid emphasis on it in reporting the incident. The 
pity of Jesus is a commonplace to us, but it was not 
such to the Galilean villagers. It takes men little 
accustomed to anything in the world but callous in- 
difference towards other people's woes some time to 
believe in exceptional, unique, phenomenal love like 
that of Jesus. They can more easily believe in mirac- 
ulous power than in miraculous love. They are able to 
say " Thou canst," before they are able to say " Thou 
wilt." Mark's addition, therefore, only shows that he 
understood perfectly the situation, or, at least, that he 
is a faithful reporter of the words of one who did. 
The other particular peculiar to Mark is equally de- 
serving of appreciation. It reveals another phase of 
Christ's love, in which it puts on an aspect of anger in 
its determination that the healed leper shall get the 
whole and not merely the half of the possible benefit. 
Jesus frowns, speaks imperatively and impatiently, and 
even thrusts the man out as it were by the shoulders, 
with an order to go at once. How life-like ! how 
beautiful this subtle play of feeling, this sudden transi- 
tion from one mood of love to another ; from pity to 



76 WITH OPEN FACE 

impatience, from the softly spoken " I will " to the 
masterful " thou must " ! 

What now was the result of this ministry whereof 
so scanty a crop of incidents has been preserved to us ? 
It may be stated in a sentence : great temporary popu- 
larity, little permanent fruit. Of the popularity we 
find a trace even in the descriptions of the crowds that 
afterwards gathered around Jesus. Matthew follows 
up his general account of the synagogue ministry with 
a brief notice of the rising tide of enthusiasm in which 
Galilee occupies a prominent place. " There followed 
Him great multitudes of people from Galilee, and 
Decapolis, and Jerusalem, and Judaea, and from be- 
yond Jordan." 1 In the corresponding statement of 
Mark, Galilee is even more pointedly indicated as the 
main contributor to the vast assembly. The second 
Evangelist distinguishes two crowds, a very large one 
coming from Galilee, and a considerable but by no 
means so great one coming from various other parts. 
What he says is this : "A great multitude from Galilee 
followed; and from Judaea, and from Jerusalem, and 
from Idunieea, and beyond Jordan, and about Tyre 
and Sidon, a multitude great" 2 — the epithet "great" 
following the noun in the second case, as if to say: 
"large also, but not so large." Galilee sends a larger 
contingent than all the rest of the country. This is 
what the synagogue sermons and the cures have come 
to. The Galileans cannot part with the Preacher and 
Healer. They are as unwilling to lose Him as were 
the people of Capernaum when He suddenly left them 
1 Matt. iv. 25. 2 Mark iii. 7, 8. 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 77 

after that memorable Sabbath evening. Therefore 
they followed Him in vast numbers from the various 
towns He had visited, crowding around Him, jostling 
Him, knocking against Him, in hope even in that rude 
way to obtain a cure for their ailments, 1 insomuch that 
it was necessary to have a boat in readiness wherewith 
to escape sea-wards in case the pressure became utterly 
unbearable. 2 

Altogether a phenomenal popularity ; yet, Jesus 
Himself being witness, the abiding spiritual outcome 
seems to have been inconsiderable. The evidence for 
this is two-fold : the Parable of the Sower, 8 and the 
complaint against the three cities, Chorazin, Bethsaida, 
and Capernaum. 4 The parable is in reality a critical 
review of Christ's past Galilean ministry. Probably 
all the parables spoken from the boat on the day on 
which the Sower was uttered were of this character, 
though Matthew's collection contains some of a differ- 
ent type. Jesus was in the mood to tell the people 
who followed Him and admired Him what He thought 
of them, and what value He set on their discipleship. 
His estimate as given in the Sower is very depressing. 
In effect it amounts to this : much seed sown, little 
fruit. The word of the kingdom, that is to say, 
scattered with a free hand in the synagogues of Galilee, 
and, for one reason or another, in most instances no 
crop visible after sufficient time had elapsed to test the 
movement by results. The parable hints at some of 
the reasons of this unfruitfulness in its description of 

1 Mark iii. 10. 2 Mark iii. 9. 

3 Matt. xiii. 3 ; Mark iv. 3 ; Luke viii. 4. 4 Matt. xi. 20 ; Luke x. 13. 



78 WITH OPEN FACE 

the various sorts of ground on which the seed chanced 
to fall. The beaten footpath, the shallow soil — a 
thin layer of earth on a bed of rock — and the land 
foul with seeds or roots of thorns, represent types of 
men with whom all religious teachers are familiar : 
the thoughtless, the superficial, and the men who are 
not destitute of mental power or spiritual depth but 
whose great lack is purity and singleness of heart. 
There were men in Galilee answering to all these 
types ; some with whom the Preacher had not a 
chance, some on whom He soon and easily made an 
impression, some whose capacity and seriousness gave 
promise of something more than temporary interest, 
even of permanent discipleship, yet destined to disap- 
point expectation through lack of moral simplicity. 
The fewest were those whose minds resembled a soil 
at once soft, deep, and clean : men of honest and good 
hearts, sincerely regarding the Kingdom of God as the 
chief end, and seeking it with generous devotion. It 
was altogether a disenchanting, bitter experience. It 
made Jesus feel, like the prophet Isaiah, as if He had 
been sent to the synagogues of Galilee not for recovery 
of sight by the blind, and of hearing by the deaf, but 
rather to make blind men blinder, and deaf men deafer 
than ever — as if this were the chief effect of His 
preaching as a whole, and of the parabolic pictures in 
particular, with which His addresses were enriched, 
and which seemed to His hearers their main attraction. 
If intention were to be judged by result, one might 
say that Jesus had gone on that preaching tour for 
the very purpose of shutting eyes and ears ; but of 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 79 

course that would be a grievous, fatal misunderstand- 
ing of His spirit. 

The disappointment connected with the synagogue 
ministry led to a change in the plan of Jesus. He re- 
solved, henceforth, to devote more attention to the 
select few who showed intellectual and spiritual capac- 
ity for discipleship. From the great multitude he 
chose a limited number of susceptible hearers, and 
from these again an inner circle of twelve. In this 
small field He hoped in due season to reap a rich har- 
vest of thirty, sixty, and an hundred fold. 

The complaint against the Galilean towns is inform- 
ing as well as saddening. It gives us a momentary 
glimpse of an extensive ministry whereof very scanty 
memorials have been preserved. Chorazin, one of the 
towns named, is nowhere mentioned except in this re- 
proachful word. It is supposed to have been situated 
on the highway to Tyre from Capernaum on the west- 
ern side of the upper Jordan. It was, doubtless, one 
of the many towns Jesus visited in connection with His 
synagogue ministry, where He had not only preached 
but wrought some remarkable cures. For another 
thing noticeable in this complaint is that the emphasis 
of its lament lies not on fruitless preaching, but rather 
on fruitless mighty ivorks. From this we learn that 
healing acts, often remarkable, like the cure of the 
leper, were a common if not constant accompaniment 
of the preaching ministry in Galilee. We are not to 
suppose, however, that Jesus Himself laid chief stress 
on them. He looks at the matter from the point of 
view of His Galilean hearers. He is aware that what 



80 WITH OPEN FACE 

they most admired and valued was the cures wrought 
on the sick, and what He says of them and to them is, 
in effect, this: " Ye heard Me in your synagogues, and, 
what is more important in your eyes, ye saw My works 
with astonishment and thankfulness at the time. And 
what has been the result ? No change in spirit or in 
life: ye remain as ye were, as thoughtless, shallow, and 
preoccupied as ever." " They repented not." 

No change noticeable in the life of Chorazin, Beth- 
saida, and Capernaum, selected to represent the many 
Galilean cities visited in connection with the syna- 
gogue ministry — such is the melancholy verdict of the 
Preacher. The reference to Tyre and Sidon suggests 
that these three towns are named not merely because 
they had been exceptionally privileged, but because of 
their commercial importance. If so, then we get this 
result, that the commercial section of Jewish society 
was as inappreciative in its attitude towards Jesus as 
the religious section. Differing widely on the surface, 
they were at one in this, that neither sought the King- 
dom of God and the righteousness of God as the chief 
good of life. 

Truly a sad account of a people with such a spiritual 
history behind it. How depressing to think that One 
anointed by the Spirit of the Father for an evangelis- 
tic mission should have no better report to give at the 
close! Alas! it is more or less the report and the bur- 
den of all high ministries in this world! Yet it is best 
not to say too much about it, or to brood over it, or to 
allow ourselves to be driven into pessimism by it. 
Keep cheerful and hopeful always, and preach a real, 



THE SYNAGOGUE MINISTRY 81 

acceptable gospel, telling men not merely that iniqui- 
ties prevail against them, but that as for their trans- 
gressions God can and will purge them away. There 
is quite enough pessimism in the world without bring- 
ing it into the pulpit. Surely it is out of place there! 
And what good can it do ? Men are saved by hope, 
not by despair; and if the preacher would make others 
hope, he must be hopeful himself. In spite of all dis- 
appointment, go on speaking sweetly and reasonably, 
now and then embodying truth in a parable, and leave 
the word to work like a charm. If that way fails, 
nothing else will succeed. So Jesus continued to do 
His work, while occasionally making His complaint. 
He was no pessimist. He was simply, as has been re- 
marked, the one great religious Optimist who cannot 
be accused of shallowness, or of shutting His eyes to 
the evil that is in the world. 

It is an interesting question in what relation the 
mission of the twelve disciples stood to the synagogue 
ministry of their Master. It may have been intended 
in part to supplement it by spreading the good news in 
Galilee more completely than Jesus had been able to 
do. But the mission of the disciples was not to preach 
in the synagogues : for that they were not yet fit. 
Theirs was a house ministry, not a synagogue ministry. 
They were to enter into the houses of such as were will- 
ing to receive them, and to stay there as long as they 
remained in any particular place, talking to the family 
and to such neighbours as dropped in concerning the 
Kingdom and its King. Of the Kingdom they could 
say little beyond the most elementary statement of 



82 WITH OPEN FACE . 

God's good-will to the penitent, but concerning the 
King they would have more to tell. Probably the 
main part of their conversation consisted of anecdotes 
about their Master, recollections of what He had said 
or done during His preaching tour ; now a parable, 
anon a healing act reported for the entertainment and 
benefit of their hearers. Such communications would 
in most cases insure for them a welcome, though in His 
instructions to the apprentice missioners Jesus contem- 
plated the possibility of an opposite reception: "Who- 
soever shall not receive you." 1 The words may ex- 
press a fear suggested by personal experience of work 
frustrated or interrupted by religious prejudice in His 
own early effort to evangelise Galilee. 

1 Matt. x. 14 ; Mark vi. 11. 



CHAPTER V 

THE MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS 

Of this part of our Lord's work, not less than of the 
synagogue ministry, the ordinary reader of the Gospels 
has a most inadequate idea. It amounts to this, that 
Jesus happened on one occasion to be present as a 
guest at a social entertainment given by one of His 
disciples, named Matthew or Levi, to associates of the 
publican class to which he had himself previously be- 
longed, and being present, ate with them without hesi- 
tation, and doubtless also addressed to His fellow- 
guests some gracious words, indicating that the door 
of the Kingdom was open even to them. Not a few 
careful students of the Evangelic Records have been 
content with this meagre conception. Yet if we could 
only shake off the trammels of custom, so as to be able 
to take a fresh view of the matter, a little reflection 
would suffice to convince us that what has just been 
stated cannot be the whole truth or even the prin- 
cipal part of it. From the nature of the case Jesus 
cannot have been merely passive in the matter, in 
the sense in which persons invited to an ordinary fes- 
tive gathering are passive, each one going because lie 
has received an invitation from the host, and without 
knowing whom he is to meet. The newly called dis- 

83 



84 WITH OPEX FACE 

ciple would not have ventured to invite his Master 
to eat with publicans without first ascertaining that 
He was willing to meet them. Nay, one may go 
further, and say that the publican-disciple would never 
have thought of or hinted at such a meeting unless 
he had been given to understand that the Master 
was not only willing but desirous to have social in- 
tercourse with the outcast classes of Capernaum. 
The initiative must really have been with Jesus. 
The whole plan must have been His. He must have 
had in His mind a deliberate intention to come into 
close fraternal contact with the " publicans and sin- 
ners." Of this design the Evangelists say nothing ; 
they simply report very briefly the main events : Mat- 
thew's call and the ensuing feast. But once we have 
got the idea of such a design into our minds, we rec- 
ognise in these two events simply the working out of 
the plan — the method employed by Jesus to give 
effect to His gracious purpose. First He calls to dis- 
cipleship a publican, doubtless with a view to ulterior 
service as an apostle, but likewise with a view to im- 
mediate service as an intermediary between Himself 
and the publicans of Capernaum. Then, through Mat- 
thew as His agent, He calls together the class to which 
the new disciple belonged, that He may eat with them 
and speak to them the good news of the Kingdom. 1 

That Jesus would entertain such a plan was to be 
expected. We have seen how much in earnest He was 
about a systematic synagogue ministry. But his earn- 
estness was not one-sided. He desired to do His duty 
1 Matt. ix. 9-13 ; Mark ii. 13-17 ; Luke v. 27-32. 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS. 85 

as the Herald of the Kingdom, impartially, to all 
classes of Jewish society. In this connection we may 
distinguish four classes. First, the religious leaders of 
Israel ; secondly, the respectable synagogue-frequent- 
ing body of the people ; thirdly, the hidden minority 
of devout men and women who had spiritual affinity 
for the New Teaching ; lastly, the social pariahs. 
Now that Jesus performed the function called for in 
reference to the first three of these four classes, is suf- 
ficiently evident from the Gospels. He criticised faith- 
fully and thoroughly scribes and Pharisees, that being 
what they needed. He went the round of the syna- 
gogues of Galilee and preached in them in turn, at 
least in as many of them as possible. He was con- 
stantly on the outlook for persons of special spiritual 
susceptibility and promise, and gradually formed them 
into a disciple-circle for the purpose of careful instruc- 
tion. In view of these familiar facts, who can doubt 
that He did not neglect the lowest pariah class, that 
He was equally conscientious and thorough in regard 
to them, that He cared for their spiritual interest in 
no casual, haphazard, or half-hearted way, but system- 
atically, persistently, and very cordially ? Neglect the 
publicans ! One would say that, whatever class was 
to be overlooked, it would not be they. Neglect the 
"sinners," neglect the neglected and despised! Im- 
possible for such a one as Jesus. 

It might be supposed, however, that there was no 
need for a special mission to the "publicans and sin- 
ners," that their interests would be sufficiently pro- 
vided for, e.g., by the synagogue ministry. But the 



R6 WITH OPEN FACE 

fact was not so. The publicans were practically, if 
not formally, excommunicated. They were as heathens 
in the esteem of religious Jews. A learned writer 
on this subject states that publicans were not reck- 
oned in religious society, quoting from the Talmud 
words to this effect : a religious person who becomes 
a publican must be driven out of religious company. 1 
"No money known to come from them was received 
into the alms-box of the synagogue or the corban of 
the Temple." 2 Such being the state of feeling, it is 
evident that few if any publicans would have an op- 
portunity of hearing any of Christ's synagogue dis- 
courses. They would probably not have been admitted 
even if they had sought entrance, and they were not 
likely to do that, for men all the world over avoid 
places of worship where they know they are not wel- 
come. There was just one chance for the publicans. 
They might join the crowds that gathered about Jesus 
wherever He went, and get the benefit of His open-air 
preaching. That they seem to have done to some ex- 
tent, for in his report of Levi's feast Mark states that 
they (the publicans) were many, and that they fol- 
lowed Jesus. 3 That was so far well. It might content 
the publicans, but it would not content the sinners' 
Friend. He would desire closer contact and more 
direct intercourse. In the interest they were showing 
He saw His opportunity, and Matthew's call and the 
feast following were the result. 

1 Otho, Lexicon Babbinico-philologicum, p. 556. 

2 Article " Publican," in Smith's Dictionary of the Bible. 

3 Mark ii. 15. 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS 87 

In the development of His plans our Lord followed 
the leadings of Providence. He began with a syna- 
gogue ministry, because, as that depended on the good- 
will of others, it was important that it should be 
started at once and pushed on vigorously before the 
suspicions of the scribes were aroused. The mission 
to the publicans was undertaken after the return to 
Capernaum from the preaching tour in the synagogues 
of Galilee. It was the natural second step. They 
were a class whom the synagogue ministry, for reasons 
already indicated, had not reached, and their presence, 
in the crowds that followed Jesus along the lake-shore 
showed that they were not beyond reach. An evan- 
gelising experiment among them was worth trying. 
So Matthew was called, and through him the festive 
gathering convened. The call of a publican to disci- 
pleship would immediately create expectation. It 
would at once be felt that He who took that bold 
step meant to do more, and that an event was impend- 
ing that would create a sensation. 

It was a great event. That is plainly indicated by 
all the three Evangelists ; but readers of the narra- 
tives, pre-occupied with the notion of a private din- 
ner party, readily fail to notice the fact. In each of 
the reports it is distinctly stated that "many" were 
present. That itself ought to open our eyes to the 
significance of the occasion, and make us think of 
a congregation embracing hundreds, rather than of 
a private entertainment to say a score of guests ; 
meeting not in the dining chamber of a house, but 
in the large open court around which the apart- 



88 WITH OPEN FACE 

ments of an Eastern house of the better class are 
built. 1 

Of course it was not a merely festive gathering. To 
eat and drink was not the sole or even the chief end of 
the meeting. Jesus from the first meant to speak to 
that remarkable assembly of social pariahs and moral 
nondescripts. The eating was subservient to that as 
the ultimate aim, a means of establishing cordial re- 
lations between Speaker and hearers, and opening a 
way for His message into their hearts. But in that 
respect it was all-important ; hence the prominence 
given to it in the narratives. The Evangelists say 
nothing about the speaking ; that they take for 
granted. They assume it will be understood by all 
their readers that Jesus would not meet with such a 
large company, and especially with a company of so 
peculiar a quality, without having something memora- 
ble and uniquely impressive to say to them concerning 
the Kingdom. As a matter of course He would tell 
them the good news of God. As a matter of course 
accordingly it is treated, a thing not needing to be 
mentioned. But of the eating careful note is taken, 
and for an obvious reason. It was the speciality, the 
thing that would create surprise on all sides — in 
fellow-guests and in outsiders ; the thing that was 
sure to be extensively talked about and that would 
inevitably make a powerful impression of one sort 
or another, winning publicans, shocking scribes and 

1 Furrer, author of a delightful book on Palestine {Wanderungen 
durch das heilige Land) assumes as a matter of course that the meet- 
ing took place there. 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS 89 

Pharisees. In giving such prominence to the social 
aspect of the function the Evangelists only show 
their full comprehension and appreciation of the 
situation. 

The thing of importance to note, however, is that 
Jesus understood the situation. He knew perfectly 
what He was doing. He knew that His line of action 
would create scandal and in all likelihood provoke 
malevolent misconstruction. But He felt that He 
must take the risk. He knew that no half-measures 
would do with the people He was trying to benefit. 
He must either be their friend, their comrade, out 
and out, or let them alone. If He could not, or 
would not, eat with them, out of a regard to social 
proprieties, the instinctive swift inference of the 
classes concerned would be : " He too is at heart a 
Pharisee. He cares a little for us, mildly pities us, 
would like to talk to us about religion ; but He 
dare not sit down at the same table with us ; He 
fears the censure of the virtuous, the tongue of the 
pious, the frown of those that pass for good." All 
this Jesus clearly perceived ; therefore He pursued 
the policy of radical, fearless, thorough-going, com- 
radeship. But He did not so act from policy. He 
acted spontaneously, without calculation, and with- 
out effort, at the bidding of a loving heart. Phe- 
nomenal miraculous love was at the bottom of the 
whole proceeding. Mere wisdom would not have been 
equal to the emergency. Nothing but love unex- 
ampled in Capernaum or anywhere else could have 
had the originality to conceive the plan, the courage 



90 WITH OPEN FACE 

to adopt it, and the tact to carry it through. What 
cares such love for conventional proprieties or evil 
tongues ? It leaps the fence, however high ; it over- 
flows the most carefully constructed embankments of 
social custom ; it will have its way, and it is prepared 
to take the consequences. 

Sure enough there were consequences to be reckoned 
with. That also the Evangelists are careful to record. 
He is a very simple man who fancies that he can in- 
dulge in the moral originality of Jesus, taking counsel 
only with love, and escape unpleasant consequences. 
All things new and original, in thought, and still 
more in action, are inevitably blamed. The best 
things, before men get accustomed to them, are treated 
as if they were the worst. So it came to pass that the 
conduct of Jesus provoked the question, " Why eateth 
your Master with the publicans and sinners ? " Nor 
was that the end or the worst of the matter. It 
came at last to hideous, horrible calumny. They said 
in effect : He associates with the reprobates because 
He is a reprobate — a drunkard, a glutton, and what 
not. 1 

So deplorable a result almost tempts the question : 
Was that well-meant movement not after all a mis- 
take ? Has a man any right to throw away his good 
name in trying to do good to others? This is a 
question of casuistry that is not likely often to arise, 
for few have love enough to expose them to any dan- 
ger. If any one feels inclined to raise the question 
in connection with our Lord's action in reference to 

1 Matt. xi. 19. 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS 91 

the publicans, it will be well that he first of all make 
an effort to understand the alternatives. There were, 
as has been already hinted, only two courses open : 
either to go the full length in comradeship or to let 
the publicans and sinners alone. A middle course in 
the circumstances was not possible. Therefore, taking 
care of His good name Avould have simply meant for 
Jesus treating the outcasts with the usual indifference. 
Now once for all that was simply impossible for Him. 
The one thing He could not do was to let people alone 
in their sin and misery. Surely a noble, honourable, 
blessed inability ! And observe what the let-alone 
policy would have involved. It could not be limited 
to the case of the publicans ; it must be carried 
through. If Jesus must neglect them to save His 
good name, how much more He would have to 
neglect ! He would have to shun the cross to escape 
the shame. And what would that have come to? 
Saving Himself and failing to save others. Nay, fail- 
ing ultimately even to save Himself. If Jesus Christ 
had made it His chief business to adapt His conduct 
to local and contemporary ideas, instead of being the 
Saviour of the world He would have been a Nobody. 
That is the penalty men pay who are too desirous to 
please their own time. In their anxiety to conciliate 
the prejudices of to-day they do nothing for the 
future, and are soon forgotten. 

In the Capernaum movement in behalf of the publi- 
cans Jesus emphatically worked for the future. No 
part of His public ministry possesses a deeper or 
more abiding significance. As a revelation of His 



92 WITH OPEN FACE 

spirit and a promise of great things to come, it 
stands on a much higher level than the synagogue 
ministry. That was a good work which had to be 
done sometime, and which was most fitly done at the 
commencement. But in it the activity of our Lord 
ran in the channel of a purely Jewish institution. 
The new wine was put into an old vessel. In that 
preaching tour among the synagogues of Galilee 
Jesus was simply a Minister of God to Israel. But 
in the mission to the publicans it was otherwise. 
The new wine was put into a new vessel. The new 
spirit found for itself at once a new sphere and a 
new method of working. Jesus then began to be a 
Servant of the Kingdom for the world. To the Jew 
a publican was as a heathen man. He is entitled to 
the honour as well as the dishonour of that identifi- 
cation, and to be regarded as the representative of 
the Gentiles as a recipient of the good news. The 
Capernaum movement was the forerunner of Gentile 
Christianity. A man of prophetic vision watching 
its progress might have said : " Then hath God also 
to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life." 

There was more than universalism latent in that 
mission. It was the cradle of Christian civilisation, 
which has for its goal a humanised society from whose 
rights and privileges no class shall be hopelessly and 
finally excluded. It was a protest in the name of 
God, who made of one blood all the nations and 
classes, against all artificial or superficial cleavages 
of race, colour, descent, occupation, or even of char- 
acter, as of small account in comparison with that 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS. 93 

which is common to all — the human soul, with its 
grand, solemn possibilities. It was an appeal to the 
conscience of the world to put an end to barbarous 
alienations and heartless neglects, and social ostra- 
cisms, cruelties, and tyrannies ; so making way for a 
brotherhood in which " sinners," " publicans," and 
"Pharisees" should recognise one another as fellow- 
men and as sons of the one Father in heaven. 

But it may be asked : If that movement was so im- 
portant, why did the Evangelists give so inadequate 
an account of it ? why, above all, did they not report 
what Jesus said on the occasion, which must have been 
extremely well worth recording, both in substance and 
in form? I will deal with this complaint before I am 
done, but meantime I remark that such as lament the 
lack ought at least to make the most of what the Evan- 
gelists have actually given us. They report one word 
Christ uttered on this occasion on no account to be 
overlooked ; not spoken indeed to the publicans, but 
to men who blamed Him for associating with them. 
It is : " They that be whole need not a physician, but 
they that are sick : I came not to call the righteous, 
but sinners." The saying consists of two parts, each 
of which serves a distinct purpose. The first part rec- 
ognises the claims of the weak on the strong ; the sec- 
ond proclaims a policy pursued in the interest of the 
Divine Kingdom. "Sinners," therefore, to be shunned 
you think? Nay, that is just the reason why they 
should be sought after, even as it is the sick whom the 
physician visits. Sinners, therefore, not worth caring 
about ? Nay, to care for them is not only a duty im- 



94 WITH OPEN FACE 

posed by love, but a policy dictated by wisdom. Of 
just such as these recovered from the error of their 
ways is the Kingdom of Heaven, whose best citizens 
are drawn not from those who pride themselves on 
their virtue, but from those who repent of their folly. 
A commonplace now, thanks to the teaching and ex- 
ample of Christ, but a startling doctrine in an age 
when it was thought that the one thing a man had to 
do was to be good himself without trying to make 
others good, and when it was taken for granted that a 
man with a mission, the founder of a new religion, the 
originator of a new society, would gather about him 
the best people he could find, and form them into a 
select, exclusive circle of superior persons. The world 
has cause to thank Jesus Christ that He came to at- 
tempt a more heroic task, to gather around Him the 
erring, the ignorant, the weak, that He might make 
them temperate, pure, thoughtful, strong. By under- 
taking this high mission He inaugurated a new era — 
the era of grace. 

Returning now to the unrecorded address, two ques- 
tions may be asked regarding it : Have we no clue to 
its drift? Is it quite certain that its most essential 
part has not been preserved? 

1. The action of Jesus speaks. It speaks to us ; it 
would speak even more impressively to the publicans 
and sinners. His presence there as a fellow-guest on 
equal terms, not as a patron but as a comrade, told its 
own story. All understood instinctively that relig- 
ion, God, man, must be something quite different for 
this new Teacher from what they were for Pharisees 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS 95 

and scribes. " He does not hate us ; He does not de- 
spise us. Holiness for Him does not mean keeping 
virtuously aloof from the unholy. Bad as we are, He 
seems to find in us some common element that He can 
love, some touch of nature that makes us kin, far apart 
though we be in our ways. In spite of our unpopular 
occupations and evil deeds, we are still at least men 
and women to Him, and apparently not without possi- 
bilities of becoming good men and good women. What 
kind of a God can He believe in ? Surely not the God 
of the scribes ! The God of the scribes, like the scribes 
themselves, looks askance on the like of us. The God 
of this Teacher must be a kindly Being like Himself, 
— One who would not be ashamed to be called even 
our God, and who would own us as His children, though 
men have cast us off." Such were the thoughts which 
in the form of dim feeling, if not in distinctly formu- 
lated conception, passed through the minds of that 
motley audience even before Jesus began to speak, 
suggested by the mere fact of His being there. By 
eating with them He silently preached a veritable 
Gospel in a symbolic sacramental act. 

And when Jesus began to speak, what else could 
He do than express in word what He had already ex- 
pressed in deed ? His line of thought was dictated by 
the impression which, as He well understood, His pres- 
ence was making upon His audience. He could only 
put into words what was in the mind of all. One 
needs only to realise the situation to be able to recon- 
struct the address, at least in outline. Tt would state 
in simple language the truth about God and His bear- 



96 WITH OPEN FACE 

ing towards erring men. It would hold out hope of 
a better future for the worst, declaring that past sin 
was no inevitable doom, and that by repentance every 
man might pass from depravity and misery into purity 
and blessedness. It would strive to cure the doubt 
latent in every heart in that assembly as to the possi- 
bility of either God or man really caring for the like 
of them, a doubt too well justified by the contemptu- 
ous indifference with which they were treated on every 
hand. " He seems to care for us, else why is He here ? 
But how can it be? What should make Him in this 
so utterly unlike all other men we have known ? And 
as for God, is it credible He can be like this Man, 
and so utterly unlike all we have been taught to be- 
lieve by our religious instructors?" Such was the 
state of mind with which the Speaker had to reckon ; 
and if He dealt with it after His wonted manner, He 
would use some happy parable to make the difficult in 
the spiritual sphere clear by a familiar story taken 
from natural life. 

2. This brings me to my second question. Is it 
quite certain that the essential part of the address of 
Jesus to the publicans has not been preserved? On 
the contrary, it is highly probable that we ought to dis- 
cover the kernel of the address in the parables concern- 
ing finding things lost contained in the fifteenth chapter 
of Luke's Gospel. They suit exactly the requirements 
of the case as above indicated. And from Luke's in- 
troductory statement we learn that the parables grew 
out of a gathering of u publicans and sinners " to hear 
Jesus, at which He not only spoke to them, but ate 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS 97 

with them. This at once suggests the Capernaum 
assembly as the real historical occasion. True, in 
Luke's account the parables are represented as spoken 
not to the publicans, but to the Pharisaic fault-finders. 
But this fact creates no serious difficulty. In them- 
selves the three parables, in their essential parts, might 
have been spoken to any audience, to a congregation in 
a synagogue, to a meeting of social pariahs, to dis- 
ciples, to Pharisees. They would simply require a 
little modification to fit them to the particular audi- 
ence. Quite possibly they were uttered again and 
again to all sorts of audiences. Matthew gives the 
first of the three, the Lost Sheep, as a word spoken 
to the Twelve in the Capernaum lesson on humility. 1 
This is perfectly credible. And it is still more cred- 
ible that not only the first, but the whole three, were 
spoken to the publicans. No more appropriate audi- 
ence could be imagined, and no one knew that better 
than Jesus. It may be matter of regret that these 
parables have not come down to us in the form of a 
sermon to a publican audience. But that the tradition 
is at fault here is not surprising. The primitive Chris- 
tian society cared much more for the words of the 
Master than for the exact historical occasions. There- 
fore we need not wonder if, in the book of the Oracles 
of the Lord compiled, according to the testimony of 
Papias, by Matthew, these golden words were faith- 
fully preserved without clear indication of their his- 
torical connection. And we have the remedy in our 
own hands. We are not bound by the connection 

1 Matt, xviii. 12. 



98 WITH OPEN FACE 

assigned to them by Luke or by the author of the First 
Gospel. We can give them the setting that is most 
fitting, and that brings out their full pathos, and claim 
them for the festive gathering in the court of the 
house of Levi, as the core of the address spoken by 
Jesus that day. It is no sin against true reverence to 
reproduce them here adapted to the circumstances by 
needful modification and brief preface. 

Jesus, then, may have spoken after this manner : 
"Men and women, I love you. I am your Brother. 
God, my Father and your Father, loves you, and 
will welcome you returning to Him in peni- 
tence. You doubt this, cannot think it possible. 
I wonder not, knowing how you have been 
spurned by your fellow-townsmen. Yet it is 
simple when you think of it. Your Father in 
heaven, and I your Brother on earth, only share 
the joy common to all who find things lost. 
Hear a parable : 
" ' A certain man had a hundred sheep, and 
having lost one of them, left the ninety 
and nine in the wilderness and went after 
that which was lost until he found it. And 
when he found it he laid it on his shoulders 
with joy. And when he came home, he 
told his neighbours, and they were all glad 
that he had found the lost sheep.' 
"Does the joy of the shepherd and his neighbours 
seem strange to you ? Such joy would I, would 
my Father in heaven, have in any of you turn- 
ing from evil to good. 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS 99 

" Not only the owner of a flock of sheep, but the 
poorest among you may know the joy of finding 
things lost. Hear another parable : 
Ui A certain woman had ten pieces of silver, 
and lost one of them. She lighted a lamp, 
swept the house, and sought till she found 
it. In her joy she told her neighbours, and 
they all rejoiced with her.' 
"Think not there may be joy in the finding of 
a sheep or a coin, but no joy in finding a lost 
man. There may be more joy over a man 
found than over the finding of any lost thing. 
Hear yet another parable : 
" c A certain man had two sons, and the 
younger of them said to his father, Father, 
give me the portion that falleth to me. 
And he divided unto them his living. And 
not many days after the younger son gath- 
ered all together, and took his journey into 
a far country, and there he wasted his sub- 
stance with riotous living. And when he 
had spent all, there arose a mighty famine 
in that country, and he began to be in 
want. And he went and joined himself 
to one of the citizens of that country; and 
he sent him into his fields to feed swine. 
And he longed to eat of the pods which 
were the swine's food, and no man gave 
unto him. But when he came to himself, 
he said : How many hired servants of my 
father have bread beyond their need, and 



100 WITH OPEN FACE 

I perish here with hunger. I will arise, 
and go to my father, and will say unto him, 
Father, I have sinned against heaven, and 
in thy sight. I am no more worthy to be 
called thy son ; make me as one of thy 
hired servants. And he arose, and came 
to his father. And when he was still at a 
great distance from home his father saw 
him, and was touched with pity, and run- 
ning towards him, he fell on his neck and 
fervently kissed him. And the son said : 
Father, I have sinned against heaven and 
before thee ; I am no more worthy to be 
called thy son. But the father said to the 
servants, Bring forth quickly the best robe, 
and put it on him, and put a ring on his 
hand, and shoes on his feet, as becometh 
a son, and bring the fatted calf and kill it, 
and let us eat and make merry. For this 
my son was dead and is alive again ; he was 
lost and is found. ' " 1 
When we think of this parable as spoken to the 
publicans in the house of Levi, we perceive that the 
festivities of that day explain the parable, and that 
the parable explains the festivities. 

What success Jesus had among the publicans we 
do not know, though I think that the story of the 
woman in Simon's house 2 may be taken as an illus- 

1 The second part of the parable concerning the elder brother 
relates to the Pharisees. 

2 Luke vii. 36-50. 



MISSION TO THE PUBLICANS 101 

trative example of the effect produced. She may 
have been there ; let us suppose she was. That day 
she saw Jesus and heard Him speak. She went home 
and thought of what He had said. And this was 
the result ; repentance, a gush of grateful emotion, 
permanent change of life. 

The method of Jesus deserved success. Nothing 
but His deep, unfeigned love, going the whole way, 
will win men. Patronising philanthropy will not do. 
Those who practise it have nothing in common with 
Jesus. " He was no patron ; He never acted in a 
condescending manner. He was the friend in the 
most genuine sense, even of publicans and harlots. 
His Kingdom cannot make progress through patron- 
age, however kindly intentioned." 1 

1 The Spirit in Literature and in Life, by Dr. Coyle. Houghton, 
Mifflin and Company : The Rand Lectures in Iowa,, 1894. A thought- 
ful, suggestive book. 



CHAPTER VI 

JESUS LOXGIXG FOE APT DISCIPLES 

It has been customary to call the remarkable utter- 
ance preserved in Matthew xi. 28-30 The Gracious 
Invitation. It has been gradually dawning on my 
mind that, without prejudice to the truth underlying 
that title, the saying might with even greater appro- 
priateness be described as the pium desiderium of the 
Great Master for apt scholars. Its setting in the Gos- 
pel narrative suggests this view. It forms the suit- 
able close of a chapter whose burden is disillusionment. 
Jesus appears in this chapter as a disappointed, though 
not discouraged or utterly forlorn. Teacher. Xowhere 
has He found the reception He might reasonably have 
looked for. The Galileans in whose synagogues He 
has preached, the people whom He has taught and 
healed wherever they gathered in crowds, the relig- 
ious guides of Israel, even John the Baptist — one and 
all have failed to satisfy His desire for sincere, intel- 
ligent, sympathetic discipleship. He finds consolation 
in the honest attachment of some humble persons 
whom He calls "babes." Yet "babes," while a com- 
fort, can hardly give complete contentment. Some- 
thing higher is easily conceivable — a class of disciples 

102 



JESUS LONGING FOR APT DISCIPLES 103 

who are babes and more, combining the simplicity of 
children with the understanding and experience of 
men. That were the ideal ; it is for that Jesus here 
sighs. 

If this sigh of the Lord Jesus be placed in its 
proper historical environment in the eleventh chap- 
ter of Matthew, its date is approximately fixed by 
the various allusions to contemporary opinions con- 
tained therein. That the synagogue ministry is past, 
is shown by the complaint against the three cities. 1 
The later mission to the publicans lies far enough 
behind to give time for the coining of slanderous 
epithets and sneering nicknames. 2 The fame of Jesus 
as a popular Preacher and Healer has spread far and 
wide till it has even reached the ears of the illustrious 
prisoner in Machaerus, provoking that doubting mes- 
sage, Art thou the Coming One? 3 The hostility of 
the scribes has had ample space to develop itself, so 
as to make it manifest that nothing but contempt 
or bitter opposition is to be looked for from the 
"wise and prudent." 4 

The situation thus defined suits such an utterance 
as that contained in Matthew xi. 25-30. The word 
and the environment fit into each other so well as to 
leave little doubt that the Evangelist has given that 
word its true position in his story, and as little that 
we may legitimately interpret it in the light of its 
context. In that case its general character is at once 
fixed. It is the utterance of One who is profoundly 
conscious of isolation, and who is driven in upon Him- 
1 vv. 20-24. 2 v. 19. 8 v. 3. 4 v. 25. 



104 WITH OPEN FACE 

self and upon God, yet is full of peace and hope be- 
cause He is assured that His Father knows and approves 
Him, and will not leave Him forlorn. Herein the soul 
of Jesus goes first up to God in resignation and trust, 1 
then out in eager longing towards an ideal discipleship 
not actually there, perhaps not to be found then any- 
where within the bounds of Palestine, but existing for 
the prophetic eye in the womb of the future, and to be 
born in due season. 2 

Surprise has often been expressed that Luke should 
have failed to preserve this precious oracle, giving only 
the outpouring of Christ's spirit towards God, and 
omitting what seems to suit his pages so well, the out- 
going of His loving heart towards the labouring and 
heavy-laden. Of this hereafter. Meantime I remark 
that what is most to be wondered at is that any part 
of the utterance has been preserved ; for it is really a 
soliloquy, a devotional meditation of our Lord by Him- 
self apart, not a prayer spoken in the hearing of dis- 
ciples. Even the part which concerns men, the sigh 
for true disciples, was not meant for human ears ; it 
was simply a private breathing in which the weary 
heart of the Master unburdened itself. How then did 
it become known to any ? True reverence perhaps 
would be best shown by abstaining from conjecture, 
but a simple suggestion may be pardoned. A ray of 
light seems to come to us from the fact that, on the 
testimony of Papias, the original reporter of our Lord's 
words was the Apostle Matthew, a publican, and in vir- 
tue of that occupation also a scribe. We have already 
i vv. 25-27. 2 vv. 28-30. 



JESUS LONGING FOR APT DISCIPLES 105 

seen that in calling a publican Jesus had an eye to 
service in connection with His mission to the class to 
which Matthew belonged. May He not also have had 
in view service with the pen by the same disciple, act- 
ing as a kind of secretary? How was it possible for 
Matthew, years after the Master left the world, to 
compile that book of Logia, i.e., Oracles of the Lord? 
Did he draw simply on a retentive memory? Is it 
not more likely that he had at command memoranda 
written in bygone disciple days? Would not the in- 
stinct or habit that led him to write the Logia lead 
him to take notes at the time ? and may the desire 
that this should be done not have been one of the 
reasons of his call? But, granting the reasonableness 
of this suggestion with reference to such sayings as 
those which constitute the Sermon on the Mount, it 
may be asked, What has all this to do with a solilo- 
quy of Jesus such as that under consideration? How 
should even a private secretary know that his Master 
had thought or spoken so ? Who can tell ? Would it 
surprise jo\x if the one disciple who had access to the 
Master at such a solemn hour was just the publican; 
the last first, the despised one privileged to be the 
confidant of the still more Despised One, despised too 
very specially on account of the relations He had 
chosen to enter into with the class to which that dis- 
ciple belonged ? When Jesus uttered this prayer, He 
passed through a kind of minor agony. At the hour 
of the greater agony He desired to have three disciples 
near Him. What wonder if He chose one to be with 
Him at the earlier crisis, and just the one most fitted 



106 WITH OPEN FACE 

by his own previous experience to understand the 
Master's mood? 

Not doubting that in the closing part of a precious 
leaf from the private prayer-book of Jesus, though pre- 
served in the First Gospel alone, we have a true word 
of the Lord, let us try still further to penetrate into 
its inmost meaning. 

In the utterance beginning with " I thank Thee, 
O Father," and ending with " My yoke is easy and my 
burden is light," there is a mixture of conflicting feel- 
ings — of satisfaction and longing, of thankfulness for 
babe-disciples, and intense desire for disciples who are 
"babes" and something more. The babes include the 
Twelve, though not them alone. Therefore Christ's 
feeling even about them is of a mixed character. He 
is pleased to have these simple Galileans about Him, 
and yet they do not fill His heart. He is conscious of 
isolation in their company. They love Him, but they 
do not understand Him. He has many thoughts in 
His mind, which He must speak if He is to fulfil His 
mission, and make known to the world the vision of 
the Kingdom which lies before His spiritual eye. But 
to whom are they to be spoken ? To these babes ? Yes, 
if no better audience can be had. They possess one 
fundamental requirement of discipleship — moral sym- 
pathy with the Teacher. They are ready to hear what 
He has to say, and they implicitly trust in His wisdom. 
To such hearers it is not idle to speak ; revelation of 
the things of the Kingdom to the like of them, to some 
extent at least, is possible. But " these things " can be 
shown to such only in part. They cannot understand 



JESUS LONGING FOR APT DISCIPLES 107 

them fully now, perhaps never. The natural limita- 
tion of their thinking powers, still more the limitations 
of their experience in the past or in the future, may 
present an insurmountable barrier to complete compre- 
hension of the ideas of their Master. It is possible 
that there is not one among them who has it in him 
to attain full insight into the Christianity of Christ, 
or to become so completely possessed by the Master's 
mind as to be fit for the role of a thoroughly compe- 
tent enthusiastic interpreter. It may be assumed as 
certain that not all, or even the majority, of them 
possess any such capacity. But to the presence or 
absence in his disciple-circle of persons endowed with 
such capabilities no great teacher or religious initiator 
can be indifferent. He will make the powers of his 
scholars a subject of frequent study. He will often 
consider what they severally are good for, what part 
this one or that one is fitted to play. And if among 
them all, after due consideration, he find no one able to 
receive or effectively reproduce his scheme of thought, 
whatever pleasure he may have in their society, he will 
certainly not be free from a haunting sense of loneli- 
ness and sadness. 

It is in some such mood and for such reasons, it 
appears to me, that Jesus here speaks. With longing 
heart He looks over the heads of the actual disciple- 
circle, with wistful eye, in quest of an ideal disciple- 
ship. 

But how is the ideal to be defined ? What are the 
marks of the perfectly apt disciple? Jesus, we observe, 
addresses Himself to the "labouring and heavy laden/' 



108 WITH OPEN FACE 

Is that the kind of description we should look for, 
assuming that an ideal discipleship is in view? To 
answer the question, one must have some sort of a 
priori conception of the ideal. How, then, are we to 
conceive it ? Somewhat after this manner : 

1. The ideal disciple will, of course, possess in a 
high degree the disciple -sjpm£ : desiring wisdom above 
all things, with a single mind and a pure heart. 

2. He will feel profoundly that he has not yet 
attained. No one comes to the school of the wise who 
is self-satisfied — who thinks he knows all and can 
himself teach others. 

The first of these qualities differentiates the disciple 
from the ordinary frequenter of synagogues, or the 
average hearer in a street crowd. The second differ- 
entiates the disciple from the "wise and prudent." 
Both qualities .were possessed by the Twelve, and 
therein their Master had cause for satisfaction. But 
there is a third quality, which they probably all lacked. 

3. The ideal disciple is one who has been prepared 
for receiving the instruction of a new master by dis- 
appointing trial of other masters. He has toiled in 
the quest of wisdom and has failed. He comes to the 
new school a weary man, longing for the rest which the 
revelation of truth satisfying to the whole inner being 
brings. He comes thoroughly qualified to appreciate 
the lessons he is to be taught by knowledge of other 
doctrines with which he can compare them. For men 
living in Palestine in the time of our Lord this would 
mean acquaintance with the teaching of the Rabbis, 
and the discovery by earnest experiment of its unsatis- 



JESUS LONGING FOR APT DISCIPLES 109 

factory character. It would mean, in other words, an 
experience similar to that of Saul of Tarsus, who was 
first an enthusiastic disciple of, and then a convert 
from, Rabbinism. Saul's soul-history in those years 
was a very tragic business — a sore toil of the spirit 
ending in vexation and heaviness of heart. What if he 
had met Jesus while He was on earth, become one of 
His disciples and heard His golden words, and seen His 
gracious deeds from day to day, instead of being " one 
born out of due time " ? 2 It might have made some 
difference in his conception of the Christian religion, 
and in the colour of his writings. But be this as it 
may, what I wish to say now is that it was for such 
disciples as he that Jesus craved ; for men who were 
not merely simple, sincere, and honest-hearted, but also 
in possession of spiritual senses exercised to discern 
between good and evil ; that is to say, not only between 
the obviously good and evil, but between the really and 
the reputedly good and between the really and the 
reputedly evil. To that the Twelve had not attained. 
Possibly there was not a single man living in Palestine 
at that time that had attained. The man who came 
inquiring concerning eternal life was on the way to the 
attainment ; hence the interest he created in the mind 
of Jesus, who saw in him a possible Paul or Barnabas, 
and may, for ought we know, have thought of him as 
a substitute for a false disciple already suspected of 
treason. But he had the fatal defect of insufficient 
earnestness. He knew more than he was prepared to 
put in practice. 

1 1 Cor. xv. 8. 



110 WITH OPEN FACE 

Is the ideal disciple, as just described, properly desig- 
nated by the epithets " labouring and heavy laden"? 
Yes, if we take the words, as they surely ought to be 
taken, in a spiritual sense. There is no toil so arduous 
as the quest of the summum bonum when carried on in 
the spirit of a Paul or a Buddha, and no burden so 
heavy as that of the heart which has long sought and 
not yet found it. Those who have passed through the 
experience know the truth of this statement, though 
to others it may seem a great exaggeration. Christ 
comprehended the labour and the burden, and pitied 
the sufferer, and yearned to give him relief. Let us 
not be deceived by the simple terms in which He 
addresses him into the prosaic idea that it is purely 
physical toil and weariness He has in view, and that in 
a spirit of disgusted reaction He turns from the dis- 
dainful scribe to the illiterate peasant for satisfying 
discipleship. Bodily labour and fatigue simply serve 
the purpose of an emblem. The toil present to His 
mind is not that which has for its object the meat that 
perisheth, but that which has for its aim the meat that 
endureth unto everlasting life. So understood, the 
words of Jesus necessarily point to the highest type of 
religious experience, that which is heroic in effort and 
temper and tragic in career. Nothing short of that 
deserves to be so characterised. Feeble desire for the 
eternal is not labour, and failure to obtain the object of 
such desire is no burden. 

When we know who are meant by the " labouring 
and heavy laden " we understand why Jesus describes 
Himself as "meek and lowly in heart." Till we per- 



JESUS LONGING FOR APT DISCIPLES 111 

ceive who are addressed, we fail to discern any fitness 
in the allusion. Might not the Teacher with equal 
appropriateness have specified some other characteris- 
tics ? Probably many a student of the Gospels, while 
drawn to this oracle by its inexpressible charm, has had 
such a feeling, though hardly willing to avow it to him- 
self. The feeling disappears when we have defined the 
ideal disciple. The underlying thought is then seen to 
be that the moods of Master and scholar correspond. 
The weary seeker after wisdom, or the knowledge of 
the Highest Good, is meek and lowly. He is as one 
whose heart has been broken and his spirit bruised. 
His heart is not haughty, nor his eyes lofty. His soul 
is even as a weaned child. He needs one who can 
speak tenderly as well as wisely, fully acquainted with 
his case, and sympathetic in his attitude towards both 
his aspirations and his disappointments. As such an 
one Jesus offers Himself. To the labouring and heavy 
laden He in effect says: " The Lord God hath given Me 
the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to 
speak a word in season to him that is weary." And 
how has He acquired this supreme talent ? By an 
experience of disappointment answering to that of those 
whom He invites to His school. They have been dis- 
appointed in their teachers, He has been disappointed in 
His scholars. In synagogue and street crowd, among 
the disciples of the Rabbis, and even in His own disciple- 
circle, His experience has been disenchanting: limited 
receptivity at the best, not infrequently a total lack of 
receptivity. So the ideal disciple and He need one 
another, and suit one another. He needs them to fill 



112 WITH OPEN FACE 

His teacher's heart, they need Hirn to satisfy the 
hunger of their souls. And there is mutual sympathy as 
well as mutual need. Similarity in experience has pro- 
duced congeniality of temper. 

When such a Teacher and such scholars meet, one 
can predict what will happen. They will find solace 
in each other's company. Of that also Jesus speaks, 
though only on one side of the joint experience. Of 
the solace the disciple will bring to Him, He makes no 
mention ; but to the solace He will communicate He 
does refer in these words : " And ye shall find rest to 
your souls." There will be at least the rest that comes 
from the sense of being perfectly understood and fully 
sympathised with. But that is not all that is needed. 
There must be instruction as well as sympathy. The 
Teacher must be able to give what the scholar has 
hitherto sought in vain : a word of eternal life that 
shall bring contentment to the whole inner being — 
mind, heart, conscience. Jesus recognises this when 
He speaks of His " yoke." The taking of the yoke 
means coming to His school, and the invitation to come 
is an acknowledgment of obligation on His part to per- 
form the Teacher's role. He must teach, and teach 
satisfactorily, so that the pupil shall not need to leave 
Him, as he has left others, and go in quest of a new 
teacher. And accordingly He promises satisfaction by 
characterising His yoke as " easy." A teacher's yoke is 
easy when his doctrine commends itself to reason and 
conscience. An easy yoke does not necessarily imply a 
low, accommodating ideal of life. On the contrary, 
the teacher's ideal may be lofty, exacting, apparently 



JESUS LONGING FOK APT DISCIPLES 11 o 

unattainable, yet the reverse of burdensome because 
sweetly reasonable and true to the deepest instincts of 
the soul. Such, as we shall see, was the moral ideal of 
Jesus as set forth in His recorded words : high and 
difficult, yet not grievous ; awakening enthusiasm, 
therefore no burden to the spirit. What a contrast 
to the yoke of the Rabbis ! 

In the light of the foregoing interpretation of 
Christ's statement concerning Himself, Ave can see 
clearly how feeble is the argument which has been 
based upon it against the authenticity of the saying 
" Come unto Me." Christ, it is argued, could not have 
said " I am meek and lowly " just because He was 
meek and lowly. Self-eulogy, even in soliloquy, is 
incompatible with humility. 1 Various things might 
be said in reply to this ethical canon of criticism. But 
the simplest way to dispose of it is to point out that 
what we have in the words objected to is, properly 
speaking, not self-eulogy but self-description. They 
describe a mood rather than lay claim to a virtue. If it 
was not egotism in the prophet to represent himself 
as one whom God had trained to speak a word in 
season to him that was weary, as little was it egotism 
in Jesus to use a form of words which in effect means 
the same thing. If a Psalmist in the Divine Presence 
might say, " My heart is not haughty," why might not 
Jesus say " I am meek and lowly " without prejudice 
to His humility? Prophet, Psalmist, and Jesus all 
speak out of the same mood, not in a spirit of boasting, 
rather in a tone of self-humiliation. Their utterances 
1 So in substance Martineau. Vide my Apologetics, p. 3C4. 



114 WITH OPEX FACE 

are the devout breathings of a broken and contrite 
heart too familiar with the vanity of life while still 
able to hope in God. 

The view here presented as to the import of the 
saying " Come unto Me," and the mood which it ex- 
presses, helps us moreover to understand its omission 
by Luke, assuming that he was not unacquainted with 
it, but knew perfectly well that it formed a part of 
a larger whole, the former portion of which he has 
preserved. We have seen that it is the way of this 
Evangelist to exercise editorial discretion in reference 
to whatever affects the character of the Lord Jesus or 
of His apostles, omitting, pruning, strongly stating, 
as the case might require. This idiosyncrasy comes 
into play here, giving rise to modification of what has 
been retained, and to the omission of what could not 
be modified. The modification consists in the altered 
mood out of which the utterance is made to spring. 
In Luke's account Jesus speaks at a moment of exult- 
ing gladness, occasioned by the glowing reports of the 
Seventy just returned from their evangelistic mission. 1 
The historical setting there assigned to the devotional 
outpouring is intrinsically improbable as compared to 
that given to it in Matthew, and the exultant mood as- 
cribed to Jesus is hardly what we should have expected 
from Him even in such a connection as Luke's nar- 
rative postulates. That the great Master had already 
found His own ministry disappointing is beyond doubt. 
Is it likely that the results of the minor efforts of the 
Twelve or of the Seventy, however gratifying so far 

i Luke x. 17-22. 



JESUS LONGIKG FOR APT DISCIPLES 115 

as they went, would move him to ecstatic joy, and to 
passionate outpouring of His soul in devout thanks- 
giving? The situation and the mood, as conceived 
by Luke, are wholly inadequate to the quality of the 
utterance. It is another instance illustrating his in- 
ability to do justice to the tragic element in our Lord's 
character and experience. 

The omission of the second part is due in some 
measure to the same inability. Luke apparently did 
not know what to make of it. He felt instinctively 
that it did not fit in to the supposed situation and 
mood. Two things would give him this feeling : the 
unmistakable tone of sadness pervading the words, 
and the description of the persons addressed as labour- 
ing and heavy laden. " I am meek and lowly in 
heart." Luke understood better than some modern 
critics that these words were the description of a mood, 
not a piece of self-eulogy ; and taking them so, he 
perceived their unsuitableness to a moment of trium- 
phant gladness. That was one reason for omission. 
Another was the inapplicability of the epithets "labour- 
ing and heavy laden " to the case of the Seventy or 
the Twelve. There need, indeed, have been no dif- 
ficulty on that score if the Avords, as Resch supposes, 1 
referred to the fatigue connected with the recent mis- 
sion, and, as employed by Jesus, meant : Come, ye 
tired and weary Evangelists, and I will give you a 
recreative holiday. But I do not think it possible 
that an idea so utterly prosaic could ever have entered 

1 In his recent work on The Extra-canonical Parallels to Matthew 
and Mark, p. 132. 



116 WITH OPEN FACE 

Luke's head. He knew enough of Christ's intellectual 
habitudes to be aware that the labour and the burden 
must be symbols of spiritual experiences. And just 
there lay his perplexity. He could not imagine the 
members of the disciple-circle as the subjects of any 
such experiences. Were they not rather happy men 
in possession of enviable privileges and powers ? Why 
should they be asked to come to Christ's school ? Had 
they not been there for some time already, and had 
they not made some progress in the lore which brought 
light and peace and contentment to the spirit ? There 
was nothing for it but to omit the words so long as 
they were supposed to refer to the disciple-circle. 
They might have been preserved as words spoken to 
other persons, as expressing a desire for a discipleship 
of a more radical and satisfying character. But that 
course was not open to Luke, who was ever anxious 
to spare the Twelve. So viewed, the " Come unto 
Me " would indicate dissatisfaction with all actual 
disciples ; therefore, even with them. Words bearing 
such a meaning Luke would certainly not report. 

Yet one other argument against the authenticity of 
this famous saying remains to be disposed of ; that, 
viz., based on an alleged literary resemblance between 
it and the Prayer of Jesus the Son of Sirach, in the last 
chapter of the Old Testament Apocryphal book which 
bears the name of the Wisdom of Sirach. That a cer- 
tain resemblance does exist, I am not disposed to deny. 
There is just enpugh to have led me years ago, in read- 
ing the book, to note in the margin a reference to 
Matthew xi. 28-30. It will be best to reproduce the 



JESUS LONGING FOR APT DISCIPLES 117 

passage in which the likeness appears, so that readers 
may judge for themselves. In the version of the 
Apocrypha, recently published by the Revisers of the 
Authorised Version of the Old and New Testaments, 
it stands thus : 

Chap. li. 23. Draw near unto me, ye unlearned, and 
lodge in the house of instruction. 

24. Say wherefore are ye lacking in these 

things, and your souls are very 
thirsty. 

25. I opened my mouth and spake : get 

her for yourselves without money. 

26. Put your neck tinder the yoke and let 

your soul receive instruction; she is 
hard at hand to find. 

27. Behold with your eyes how that I 

laboured but a little and found for 
myself much rest. 

28. Get you instruction with a great sum 

of silver and gain much gold by her. 

29. May your soul rejoice in His mercy, 

and may ye not be put to shame in 
praising Him. 

30. Work your work before the time 

cometh, and in His time He will give 
you your reward. 

The resemblance is in the passages I have marked in 
italics, and it is real so far as it goes. Far from wish- 
ing to deny this, I am rather tempted to exaggerate 



118 WITH OPEN FACE 

the extent of the likeness, because if it were certain 
that the author of the words in the Gospel, whoever he 
Avas, had the Prayer of the Son of Sirach in his view, 
an argument might thence be drawn for the unity of 
the whole passage (Matt. xi. 25-30). For Sirach's 
prayer, like this evangelic section, begins with a prayer 
and ends with an invitation, and the first word of both 
prayers is the same. 1 If the utterance of the later 
Jesus be a composition based on the devout outpouring 
of the earlier, then Matthew has preserved the whole of 
it and Luke has given only a fragment. It is worth 
noting a literary affinity which has any chance of yield- 
ing so satisfactory a result. But it may be feared that 
what we gain in one direction we lose in another. In 
other words, the question readily suggests itself, Does 
the literary affinity, once recognised, not compel the 
admission that Matthew xi. 25-30 is not a genuine 
utterance of our Lord, but a composition by the Evan- 
gelist, or by some one from whom he has borrowed ? 
Without hesitation I say, by no means. Why should 
not the resemblance in question be the result of an 
acquaintance on the part of Jesus Himself with the 
Wisdom of Sirach, an acquaintance dating possibly 
from boyhood, and leaving its traces in phrases which 
perhaps unconsciously colour the style of His address 
to ideal disciples ? How far, as a matter of fact, ac- 
quaintance with an Apocryphal book such as Sirach 
was likely to be possessed by non-professional Galileans 
in the time of Christ, I do not know. But on the 

1 " I will give thanks to Thee," in Sirach ; " I thank Thee," in the 
Gospel. 



JESUS LONGING FOR APT DISCIPLES 119 

hypothesis we are considering, some one belonging to 
the early Christian Church knew the book ; and if 
that was possible for him, why not also for Jesus? 
And if the book was within His reach, I do not think 
He would have any scruple about perusing it. He 
might read it as a good book though not canonical ; 
and though abstaining in the time of His public minis- 
try from citing it as authoritative Scripture, He might 
not think it necessary to be anxiously on His guard 
against allowing its phrases to find an occasional faint 
echo in His own style. 

All this is merely hypothetical reasoning. Whether 
the resemblance between the two devotional utterances 
be more than an accident, I am not prepared confi- 
dently to determine. It is so slight that it might 
quite well be an utterly undesigned coincidence. It 
concerns the expression chiefly, hardly at all the 
thought, in respect of which the utterance of the Lord 
is incomparably superior. Even in the matter of style 
the words of the earlier Jesus are poor by comparison. 
How artificial and stilted its diction compared with the 
simplicity, felicity, and spontaneity of the " Come unto 
Me " ! This has taken its place among the golden 
words of the religious literature of mankind. The 
" Draw near unto me " of Sirach has nothing in it to 
insure even temporary fame, not to speak of immortal- 
ity. It is redolent of the lamp rather than of Divine 
inspiration. I owe an apology to devout Christian 
people for placing the two prayers side by side even 
for a moment. My excuse must be that modern critics 
have compelled me. 



120 WITH OPEN FACE 

The unity of Matthew xi. 25-30 justifies an im- 
portant inference as to the central truth the great 
Master is to communicate to His ideal disciples. It is 
that God is a Father. In the first part of the de- 
votional soliloquy He has spoken of that truth as a 
secret which it is His exclusive prerogative to reveal. 
It must be supposed to be present to His mind when 
He proceeds to invite the labouring and heavy laden. 
That truth He will be pleased to reveal to them. The 
revelation He expects to give them deep satisfaction. 
As the Revealer of that truth, they will recognise in 
Him a Teacher standing in sharp contrast to their 
other masters, and One whose yoke is easy because the 
truth He teaches sets free from everything in religion 
that imposes fetters on the spirit. Nothing but a true 
doctrine of God can meet the requirements of the case. 
The vital thing in religion and in life is how we con- 
ceive God. On the idea we cherish of the Divine 
Being it depends whether our religion is to be a bnne 
or a blessing, emancipating or enslaving, in moral ten- 
dency elevating or degrading. Come then to Christ's 
school, all ye who desire the true knowledge of God. 
Learn of Him how to think of God, man and their 
relations. His doctrine solves all vital problems : the 
problems of past sin, of present duty, and of future 
destiny. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 

Ouk, main source of information for what I venture 
to call the Escapes of Jesus is Mark's Gospel. The 
narrative of the second Evangelist contains sundry 
intimations of the desire of our Lord to get away from 
crowds into retreats where quiet intercourse with His 
disciples was possible. For hints are not wanting that 
this was the leading aim of these acts of retirement. 
As a sample may be cited these words : " They de- 
parted thence and passed through Galilee, and He 
would not that any man should know it, for He was 
teaching His disciples." 1 Of the instruction commu- 
nicated to the Twelve, Mark has preserved compara- 
tively little, but he more than any other of the 
Evangelists has made apparent how much they needed 
it. One of his realistic touches is a question he repre- 
sents the Master as addressing to His disciples : How 
do ye not understand? 2 The disappointment border- 
ing on impatience to which that question gave occa- 
sional expression was, it is to be feared, a chronic 
feeling in Christ's mind in reference to the men whom 
He had chosen. They were far enough from being 

1 Mark ix. 30, 81. 2 Mark viii. 21. 

121 



122 WITH OPEN FACE 

ideal scholars, and Mark of all the Evangelists takes 
least pains to hide the fact. That they did not under- 
stand is patent in his pages, and that their Master 
sought opportunities for dispelling their ignorance is 
equally so. Thus witness is indirectly borne in this 
Gospel to extensive instruction, unreported in its 
pages, which we are prepared to find in fuller reports 
of our Lord's ministry. It is noticeable that Mark, as 
if conscious of the defect of his Gospel on the didactic 
side, tries to compensate for the lack of detail by gen- 
eral statements as to activity in teaching where Mat- 
thew, e.g., strong in the didactic element, represents 
our Lord as occupied in a healing ministry. Instances 
may be found in Mark x. 1., xi. 18, compared with 
Matthew xix. 2, xxi. 14. 

The escapes of Jesus took place in all directions 
possible for one whose work had for its geographical 
area the western margin of the sea of Galilee. He 
might retreat to the hill country behind, or to the 
eastern shore of the lake, or to the northern border- 
land. He made His escape successively in each of 
these directions; first once to the Hill, then twice to 
the eastern shore, then twice (apparently) northwards, 
making five attempts in all to withdraw into congenial 
solitude. The first three were escapes from the people 
gathered in immense crowds ; the last two were escapes 
not entirely from the people but also from their re- 
ligious leaders. 

1. The Escape to the Hill. — " He goeth up into the 
mountain." 1 That this movement was of the nature 

1 Mark iii. 13. 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 123 

of an escape becomes clear when we attentively con- 
sider all the circumstances. Very significant in the 
first place is the fact stated just before, that Jesus 
instructed His disciples to have a boat waiting 
" because of the crowd, lest they should throng 
Him." 1 A boat of course could be of no use for an 
ascent to the hill- tops, but the point to be noted is the 
desire and intention to escape somehow, and in some 
direction when the crowd became inconveniently large 
and eager. Such a crowd, it is next to be observed, 
had gathered around Jesus at the time when He made 
the ascent; a motley company of diseased persons, 
elbowing their way towards Him and pressing in upon 
Him from every side, that they might touch His body 
and so get rid — as they hoped — of their ailments; 
while demoniacs on their knees screamed in hideous 
chorus: "Thou art the Son of God." It was a dis- 
orderly scramble for a cure threatening danger to the 
person of the Healer, and distasteful to His spirit 
through the superstition it revealed; and it is no 
wonder that Avith all His " enthusiasm of humanity " 
He wished Himself well out of it. The ascent of the 
mountain was the expedient He adopted for self-extri- 
cation; and the next significant circumstance to be 
noted is that He goes not alone, but accompanied by a 
band of men, whom, in a manner not indicated, He 
picks out of the crowd, to serve as a kind of body- 
guard. They are doubtless chosen with an eye, not 
merely to this immediate service of protection, but to 
prospective discipleship, — a first selection out of which, 

1 Mark iii. 9. 



124 WITH OPEN FACE 

after due acquaintance in the hill retreat, a second will 
be made, sufficient with those previously called to 
make up the inner circle of the Twelve. But a 
defence against the mob they are meant in the first 
place to be, so implying a resolute purpose to secure 
for a season relief from an overwhelming embarrassing 
popularity. That the device succeeded appears from 
the fact that the multitude is represented as reassem- 
bling on learning that Jesus had descended from the 
mountain. They had not followed, they had dispersed 
to their homes, but on the report spreading " He is 
back again," the scarcely lulled enthusiasm easily 
revived. 

How was Jesus occupied on the hill-top ? Mark is 
silent on the point, but one cannot hesitate as to the 
answer. What could He be doing but teaching His 
disciples, considering their need of instruction, the 
extreme difficulty of finding leisure for this important 
work, and the welcome recreation that would come 
from so congenial a change of occupation ? And see- 
ing that the ascent of the mountain was of the nature 
of an escape from a too importunate crowd, the proba- 
bility is that the sojourn up there was prolonged so as 
to give time for the vast gathering to disperse, and 
lasted for at least some days, during which a consider- 
able body of instruction could be given in separate les- 
sons, each day having its own theme. In short, all 
points to this as the occasion on which the so-called 
" Sermon on the Mount " was delivered. That sermon, 
as reported in Matthew, is probably the summary of a 
week's instruction in a summer school at which the 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 125 

recently selected body of disciples, including the Twelve, 
were the audience. Instead of the " Sermon on the 
Mount " it might, as suggested in the first chapter, be 
more appropriately called the Teaching on the Hill. 
For it is teaching, not preaching, and the persons ad- 
dressed are not a large miscellaneous crowd, but a 
select band of men with some aptitude for disciple-lore. 
This distinction between sermon and teaching, people 
and disciples, while not without justification in Mat- 
thew's narrative, is by no means firmly adhered to 
there, and all traces of it have disappeared in Luke's 
version, where the famous discourse of our Lord as- 
sumes the character of an address to a large assembly 
such as that from which in Mark's narrative He is 
represented as making His escape. Yet the circum- 
stances as described in the Second Gospel, the proba- 
bility that the ascent there mentioned was the occasion 
on which the discourse was delivered, and, last but not 
least, the nature of its contents, compel the conclusion 
that a limited body of disciples, not a miscellaneous 
assembly, constituted the audience. 

Why has Mark not reported any of that memorable 
Teaching? Possibly because he was not able. Such a 
body of deep thought could not be treasured up for 
long years in the memory of any disciple, however 
attentive or intelligent ; therefore Peter, Mark's apos- 
tolic source, could not repeat it from memory in his 
preaching. In all probability it would have been lost 
to the world unless some disciple, Matthew, e.g., had 
made written memoranda at the time. These memo- 
randa, we must suppose, found a place in the Oracles 



126 WITH OPEN FACE 

of the Lord, which, according to Papias, that disciple 
compiled, and thence passed in diverse versions to the 
pages of our First and Third Gospels. But why could 
not Mark also have got them from the same source? 
Probably for the simple reason that he did not know 
it. The contrary view indeed has been very confi- 
dently maintained by some scholars, very specially by 
Dr. Bernhard Weiss. While acknowledging the in- 
genuity of that able theologian's reasoning, I think the 
point very doubtful ; and one of my reasons for doing 
so is just this, that Mark is so utterly silent about the 
Teaching on the Hill. 

2. The first Escape over the Lake to the Eastern Shore. 
— This took place according to Mark on the day of the 
Parabolic Discourse, and that it was indeed of the 
nature of an escape is very clear from his narrative. 
On the same day, at eventide, when He had ended his 
address from the boat to the vast multitude on the 
shore, Jesus abruptly says to His disciples : " Let us 
cross over to the other side." 1 Whereupon, leaving 
the multitude where they were (not "sending them 
away," as the Authorised Version has it), the disciples 
take Him as He was, i.e., without delay and without 
any preparations for a journey, along with them in the 
boat eastward as directed. 2 It was an escape along the 
only possible line of retreat, landing on the western 
shore being impossible, owing to the vastness of the 
crowd. To get away even seawards was not easy, 
other boats having gathered around that in which Jesus 
was, full of people eager to get near the Speaker that 
1 Mark iv. 35. 2 Mark iv. 36. 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 127 

they might hear Him distinctly. 1 These apparently 
trivial particulars, as given in the Second Gospel, are 
obviously realistic reminiscences of an eye-witness, and 
when duly considered call up a vivid picture of the 
situation. Jesus, weary with talking, and with the 
excitement of a great assembly (so weary that He falls 
asleep as soon as the boat begins to move), desires 
quiet and rest, and at a glance perceives that there is 
only one way of obtaining them, and gives orders ac- 
cordingly. His disciples, gathering His wish from 
word, tone, and gesture, with the promptitude of ex- 
perts move off at once, without a thought of where pre- 
cisely they are going, or what is to be done in the 
matter of food and lodgings. Possibly their impres- 
sion is that the voyage eastwards is simply a round- 
about way of getting to the western shore, and so 
home, after the people have dispersed in the evening 
twilight. In that case the movement would have been 
simply an escape without an ulterior object. But it is 
probable that Jesus had more in view, — the obtain- 
ment of a time of leisure in a region where He was 
unknown, during which He might discuss Avith the 
disciples the incidents of the day and the lessons to be 
gathered from them. For the parabolic discourse, and 
especially the utterance of the Parable of the Sower, 
was an important event which meant much for the 
people, for Jesus, and for the Twelve. 

From all the synoptical accounts it is clear that the 
parabolic discourse, and especially the main parable, 
formed the subject of a conversation between Jesus and 

1 Mark iv. 30. 



128 WITH OPEN FACE 

His disciples. Over the time, the place, and the pre- 
cise details of the conversation, a certain amount of 
obscurity hangs, but some points are clear : that the 
disciples desired to know why their Master had spoken 
to the people so, that He gave them explanations on 
that point, and that He further took pains to impress 
on them their responsibilities as disciples. 1 

As to the first, what the Twelve desired to know 
was probably, not why their Master spoke to the peo- 
ple in parables, but why He spoke to them in such 
parables. That He spoke to them in parables could be 
no surprise, for He had been doing that all along, in 
every synagogue, and wayside discourse. But in para- 
bles like the Sower, there was, the disciples felt, a 
new element : a tone of disappointment audible, a 
spirit of criticism unmistakable. They perceived of 
course that these critical parables grew out of the 
Master's preaching experience, and at bottom what 
they wanted to know was, why He was dissatisfied. 
And His reply in substance was that for various reasons 
hinted at in the Sower, and further explained after- 
wards, in very many cases His efforts had been vain. 
The word had not fructified, the hearer had not heard 
to profit. 

From reflections on this depressing topic the transi- 
tion would be easy to the subject of disciple-responsi- 
bility. The moral of the parable-discourse so far as 
the Twelve were concerned was : if the word fail of 
effect in so many instances, see that there be no failure 
in your case. The Master Avas saying to them indi- 

1 Vide Mark iv. 10-25. 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 129 

rectly : you are my hope ; you specially, if not exclu- 
sively, are my good soil, soft, deep and clean ; see that 
ye bring forth fruit abundant and mature. This He 
said to them directly afterwards in private intercourse, 
when He exhorted them to take heed how they heard 
so that they might understand, indicated that intelli- 
gence would be in proportion to attention, and im- 
posed on them the duty of communicating knowledge 
thus attained ; in parabolic language the duty of plac- 
ing the lamp on the stand. 1 By the choice parable of 
the Blade, the Ear and the Ripe Corn, 2 He gave them 
to understand that He did not expect them to realise 
His ideal in a day. He would give them time, and be 
content if they brought forth the ripe fruit of their 
schooling eventually as the result of a law of gradual 
growth. 

3. The next Escape also took the shape of a voyage 
across the lake, this time in a north-easterly direction. 
It occured shortly after the return of the Twelve from 
their house-mission in Galilee. 3 Its character as an 
escape is distinctly revealed in the terms in which the 
proposal was introduced by Jesus. Its ostensible aim, 
as therein represented, was to secure an interval of rest 
for the disciples ; not, as one might naturally imagine, 
from the fatigues of the mission, but from the incessant 
demands created by a constant stream of people coining 
and going, not leaving even so much leisure as was need- 
ful for taking food. 4 The attempt to get away from the 
excited crowd in this case, as in the former, proved a 

1 Mark iv. 21-25. 2 Mark iv. 26-29. 

3 Mark vi. 30, 31. 4 Mark vi. 31. 

K 



130 WITH OPEN FACE 

failure, though not for the same reason. In the former 
instance the plan was frustrated through an unex- 
pected encounter with a madman ; this time defeat was 
due to the enthusiasm of a multitude determined not 
to be baulked, who, observing that the Master and His 
disciples were making for the head of the lake, started 
off at a run and made such speed as to be on the 
ground before them. 1 In both cases Jesus had to do 
what He had not intended — perform a wonderful 
work : on the earlier occasion curing a demoniac who 
imagined himself possessed by a legion of devils, on the 
later feeding thousands of hungry people in a desert. 

There is a mystery about this third flight from the 
people. One cannot but suspect that more than mere 
physical rest was aimed at. What was the meaning of 
sending the Twelve away alone, after the feeding, back 
to the western shore ? 2 It looks as if there was some- 
thing going on which made their absence desirable. 
And what did that coming and going of the people on 
the other side, before the eastward voyage, signify ? 
No mention is made of sick being brought to be healed. 
Something else seems to be in the people's mind for 
the moment. What can it be ? The Fourth Gospel 
here gives us a clue in the remarkable statement that 
the people whom Jesus fed in the desert desired per 
force to make. Him a King. 3 If that was really the 
fact, the idea did not come into their heads then for 
the first time. The project then only reached its cri- 
sis. That was what the coming and going had been 
about, and it was to the disciples rather than to the 
1 Mark vi. 33. 2 Mark vi. 45. 3 John vi. 15. 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 131 

Master that the stream of visitors came, finding them 
not unsympathetic. The movement, congenial to the 
spirit of Galileans and too easily put into their minds, 
may have sprung out of the house-mission. The 
Twelve had been only too successful. They had 
talked about the Kingdom and this was what came of 
it — a political scheme. Wild as it may seem to us, it 
would appear perfectly natural to them. What was to 
be the issue of that immense enthusiasm ? Was it to 
end in smoke? Was not the inevitable consummation 
to make the marvellous Teacher and Healer the actual 
head of a reformed state ? 

No better explanation can be given of Christ's mani- 
fest desire to separate His disciples from the people 
than the supposition that the Galileans entertained 
such a project, and that the Twelve more or less sympa- 
thised with it, at the time of their return from their 
mission. Assuming this to be the fact we understand 
what kind of " rest " was aimed at. It was above all 
rest from illusions, from the fever of false, foolish 
enthusiasms, from mental excitement over a fond scheme 
which, if not resolutely opposed, would end in disaster. 
Such rest Jesus must at all hazards secure for His dis- 
ciples if they are to be of any use to Him, to help and 
not frustrate His plans. The time has come when the 
question, Whither ? must be dealt with. The Master 
knows the true answer to the question, but the disciples 
do not. A false issue is in their view. The first thing 
to be done therefore is peremptorily to negate the issue 
they contemplate. To accomplish this was the real 
motive of the voyage towards the north-eastern shore. 



132 WITH OPEN FACE 

The next task will be to make known the true issue. 
To secure leisure for explanations on this momentous 
topic was a leading motive for the two nights remain- 
ing to be mentioned. 

4. The Escape in the Direction of Tyre and Sidon. 1 — 
Some Biblical scholars are of opinion that there was 
only one excursion to the northern confines of Palestine 
which in the Gospel narratives has, through some con- 
fusion in the tradition, got broken up into two : a longer 
one into the territories of Tyre and Sidon, and a later, 
shorter one to the neighbourhood of Csesarea Philippi. 
This question may be left on one side, all the more 
that, even if there were, as I believe, two distinct jour- 
neys, they were one in general aim. The common pur- 
pose of both was to get away for a season, completely 
and securely, at once from enthusiastic but foolish 
crowds, from well-meant but futile political plots, and 
from the recently manifested ill-will of religious leaders 
more to be feared than anything, 2 that in solitude and 
silence Jesus might brace His own spirit for the fatal 
crisis which from concurrent signs He knew to be 
approaching, and at the same time prepare His disciples 
for an issue of which they little dreamt. That He 
went so far away, this time, needs no explanation. 
The reason simply was that not otherwise could He 
attain His end. The previous attempt to escape had 
failed because the place of retreat was too near the 
scenes of labour. The new movement of retirement 

1 Mark vii. 24. 

- Vide the encounter between Jesus and the scribes in reference to 
washing of hands in Matthew xv. 1-20 ; JIark vii. 1-22. 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 133 

therefore must be towards regions so remote that pur- 
suit was not to be apprehended. And it must be 
northwards, not southwards, for geographical and for 
moral reasons. The northern boundary lay nearest 
Galilee, and the time had not come for the southern 
journey. Jesus will go to Jerusalem to die ; He must 
go to the North to prepare to die. 

The first of the two northerly excursions seems to 
have been of considerable extent. Mark names in con- 
nection with it Tyre, Sidon, Decapolis, and the sea of 
Galilee. Connecting these points we get a journey, 
first northwards to and through the above named mari- 
time countries, then eastwards over the Lebanon range 
to the neighbourhood of Damascus, 1 then southwards 
and westwards through the region of the ten cities, 
and finally over the Jordan and back through Galilee 
to the original point of departure. If this was the 
route it would occupy a considerable time. How were 
the days of that eventful pilgrimage filled up ? The 
Gospel records here are very meagre. Mark tells us 
most, but even he reports only a couple of incidents : 
the encounter with the woman of Canaan, and the cure 
of a deaf-mute, apparently at some point on the route 
through Decapolis. In both cases he takes pains to 
show how much Jesus desired privacy. In connection 
with the earlier incident he remarks that Jesus " would 
have no man know," where He was, 2 and in connection 
with the later he carefully notes that Jesus took the deaf- 
mute "aside from the multitude privately," and after the 

1 Pliny includes Damascus in Decapolis (H. N. Cap. V. 16). 

2 Mark vii. 24. 



134 WITH OPEN FACE 

cure, charged all who witnessed it to "tell no man." 1 
The second Evangelist stands alone in the emphasis with 
which he brings out this fact in reference to the later 
period of our Lord's life, though even he fails to explain 
fully its rationale. That happily, with due reflection 
on the data supplied, we are able to do for ourselves. 
Both the incidents reported by Mark possess their 
own distinctive points of interest. The prominent 
feature in the earlier occurrence is the seeming reluct- 
ance of Jesus to grant the succour craved by a distressed 
mother for her suffering daughter. In the later, while 
still bent on privacy, He made no objection to working 
the cure asked, though in this case also the sufferer was 
not improbably a Gentile. What did that reluctance 
mean ? In Matthew's narrative Jesus is reported to 
have pled as an excuse for it that His Mission was to 
the lost sheep of Israel. The plea might have provoked 
the rejoinder, Why then are you here ? Israel's Sav- 
iour a fugitive from Israel's land ! Perhaps that was 
just what Jesus Himself was thinking of at the moment, 
and also what He wished His disciples to reflect on. 
His position as a fugitive was fitted of itself to raise in 
His mind the question as to the ultimate destination 
of His Gospel. In the circumstances the coincidence 
of the Syrophenician woman's request, in spite of His 
desire to remain unknown, would readily assume the 
significance of an omen. An isolated case might thus 
be transformed into a representative instance, the whole 
Gentile world in the person of that Syrian mother say- 
ing in beseeching tones : Come over and help us ! On 

1 Mark vii. 33, 36. 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 135 , 

that hypothesis the reluctance to heal becomes very 
intelligible. In other circumstances Jesus might have 
granted the request without hesitation and without 
remark, viewing the case as a mere exception involving 
no principle. But in the actual situation He has to 
realise for Himself the serious import of what He is 
asked to do, and also if possible make it apparent to 
His disciples. To Himself He has to say : My Mission 
was to Israel, is this a new call ? To His disciples : 
You sympathised with the wish of the Galileans to 
make me King of a reformed Israel ; do you know 
what the request of this woman which you seem in- 
clined to back really signifies ? It portends the trans- 
ference of the Kingdom of God from Jewish to Gentile 
soil. What Jesus said to the woman may be inter- 
preted in the light of the same hypothesis. " It is not 
permissible, or it is not meet, to take the children's 
bread, and to cast it to the dogs," said He with apparent 
harshness. Had she known the whole facts of the case 
she might have replied : True Master, but have the 
children not already got their bread, and have they not 
themselves thrown it to the dogs ? Is that not the rea- 
son of your being here ? That would have been an 
argument difficult to answer ; yet her actual reply to 
Christ's objection served her purpose even better, re- 
vealing as it did a humble faith which went straight to 
His heart and suggested the thought : The Pagans 
after all not dogs but children. 

Jesus, it seems to me, used the case of the Syrophe- 
nician woman to give His disciples an object-lesson on 
the claims of the Gentile ivorld. And the whole of that 



136 WITH OPEN FACE 

circular journey in Gentile lands would be an educa- 
tion to them on that subject, and probably was intended 
by their Master to serve that purpose. What He said 
to them we know not, but we can conceive what the 
world itself would say. " The sun shines here as well 
as in Galilee ; why may not the gracious love of the 
Father in heaven be here also ? " Or was that too 
abstruse a lesson in theology for them as yet to com- 
prehend? 

The leading feature in the later incident of this 
journey is the curious details regarding the manner in 
which our Lord effected the cure of the deaf-mute. 
These are probably not to be regarded as an indication 
of Christ's habitual method of working cures, but 
rather as something peculiar to the individual case, and 
on that account deemed worthy of note by the Evange- 
list, or the original reporter. The acts specified, put- 
ting a finger into each ear, and touching the tongue, 
were not means but symbols of cure ; and perhaps we 
should find in their use on this occasion a hint that the 
disease itself had for the mind of the healer a symbolic 
significance: physical deafness and dumbness an em- 
blem of the spiritual condition of Israel, or possibly of 
the Gentile world. Thus may be explained the sigh 
which Jesus heaved in working the cure. It was a 
sigh not over the physical malady of an individual, but 
over the spiritual malady of a people, in Israel's case, 
alas, not curable. 

5. The Escape towards Cozsarea Philippi. 1 — The 

1 Matthew xvi. 13 ; Mark viii. 27 ; Luke ix. 18. There is no indi- 
cation of locality in Luke. 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 137 

immediate occasion of this new journey towards the 
north was the demand for a sign on the part of the 
Pharisees, which to our Lord appeared a thing of very 
evil omen. 1 As to its psedagogic purpose in reference 
to the disciples there is no room for doubt. If on the 
earlier journey, by the way of Tyre, Sidon, and Decapo- 
lis, Jesus sought to familiarise His disciples with the 
thought that the Kingdom for whose coming they ar- 
dently longed might eventually pass away from Israel, 
during this later one His aim was to initiate them into 
the mystery of His own ignominious fate. The two 
subjects were closely connected. The events involved 
were related to each other as cause and effect. The 
rejection of Jesus would have for its necessary conse- 
quence the forfeiture by Israel of her privilege, the 
passing of the vineyard into other hands. Logically, 
therefore, the fate awaiting their Master should have 
been the first subject of instruction for the disciples. 
But it was by far the harder theme, therefore it formed 
the subject of the later lesson. It was a wide theme, 
with many aspects, as well as a hard one, and there is 
ground for believing that during the weeks taken up 
with the Csesarea excursion, it formed the leading topic 
of many an earnest conversation. With reference to 
a certain stage of the journey, Mark states that Jesus 
was teaching His disciples and was saying to them : 
The Son of man is delivered up into the hands of men, 
and they shall kill Him. 2 There was not merely an 

1 Matt. xvi. 1 ; Mark viii. 11. 

2 Mark ix. 31 . The verbs represented in English by " was teaching " 
and "was saying" are in the imperfect, implying continuous action. 



138 WITH OPEN FACE 

announcement, but a course of instruction. The fact 
was stated again and again, and made the subject of 
explanatory discourse in which it was pointed out what 
causes were at work inevitably leading up to such a 
catastrophe, and how well the event predicted would 
correspond with Old Testament prophetic anticipations. 
The leaven of the scribes of which the Master had bid 
His disciples beware, 1 would afford matter for much 
talk, as supplying in its evil nature a sufficient answer to 
the question, Why take so gloomy a view of the future ? 
And the prophetic delineations of the sufferings of 
God's servants would receive their due share of atten- 
tion, as showing how likely moral fidelity and trib- 
ulation are to go together in this world. No fear of 
conversation flagging in the Jesus-circle in those 
eventful weeks. 

The subject was first introduced on the way north- 
wards towards Csesarea Philippi 2 and very appositely 
by a question which had, and was probably intended to 
have, the effect of eliciting from the disciples a decla- 
ration of their faith in the Messiahship of their Master. 
This faith was not the birth of the moment ; it was 
really involved in the sympathy evinced by the dis- 
ciples with the project to make Jesus King. Jesus 
desired now to draw them into a confession of their 
faith, that He might set it in a new order of ideas. 
Hitherto their logical position has been : the Christ 
(shown to be such by word, deed, and spirit), therefore 
worthy to be Israel's glorious crowned King. The 

1 Matt. xvi. 6 ; Mark viii. 15. 

2 Mark viii. 27. 



THE ESCAPES OF JESUS 139 

logic of the scribes on the contrary has been : deserving 
by his conduct to die, therefore his Christhood in- 
credible. Jesus wishes His disciples to know that 
neither their logic nor that of the scribes is sound, and 
that the truth lies in the antinomy: the Christ, yet 
doomed to an ignominious death. What an abstruse 
lesson for these poor fishermen and publicans ! No 
wonder they kicked against the goad. But there was 
no help for it. Both members of the antinomy were 
true, and neither could be seen in its full truth except 
in company with the other. What a tragic event the 
death of Jesus became when it was seen to be the death 
of a Messiah, and what a fierce light was thrown on the 
nature of Messianic dignities and functions when it 
was made clear that the destiny of a true Christ is to 
be crucified by and for the world ! It is not surpris- 
ing that Jesus took great pains to indoctrinate His fol- 
lowers in these high matters, making them the absorb- 
ing theme of conversation from this time onward. Only 
by much iteration could they be made intelligible. 
After all His pains, the disciples had not learnt their 
lesson when the end came. But one thing they did un- 
derstand then: that what had happened was what their 
Master had again and again said would happen; and 
this helped to bring them safely through the crisis. 



CHAPTER VIII 

YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 

We return to the first Escape and to the Teaching on 
the Hill. Up there on the mountain-top Jesus is alone 
with His chosen disciples, enjoying a welcome season 
of recreation away from the sweltering heat and the 
crowds of the lake-margin, and finding rest in a change 
of occupation. The Preacher and Healer now becomes 
the Teacher, initiating His scholars into the mysteries 
of the Kingdom of Heaven. Heaven's peace reigns in 
the hearts of Master and scholars alike, the while. It 
is for all a sacred blessed holiday. The holiday mood 
is traceable throughout the recorded sayings of the 
Master during this season of repose; the tranquillity of 
the uplands, the neighbourhood of the skies. In some 
parts of the discourse especially, e.g., the Beatitudes 
and the admonition against care, there is a divine sim- 
plicity, a lyric beauty, a light-hearted buoyancy that 
charm us, and tend for the moment to transform us into 
citizens of the Kingdom, and elevate us into the upper 
regions of celestial tranquillity. Here we have a 
chance of seeing into the very heart of Jesus. Of 
course it is but a glimpse that is now attainable. For 
an elaborate study of the Teaching on the Hill, this is 

140 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 141 

not the place. But we may form a slight acquaint- 
ance with the Master's thoughts concerning God, 
man, and the true life of man. The first of these 
three related topics will engage our attention in this 
chapter. 

Christ introduced into the language of religion a 
way of speaking concerning God which was new, if not 
absolutely, at least in emphasis and import. He called 
God Father. "Your Father which is in heaven." 
But He did not, as perhaps we might have wished, 
offer any formal definition of the sense in which He 
used the name. He defined simply by discriminating 
use, employing the name in connections of thought 
which invested it with special significance. He used 
the title in this way sufficiently often to invest it for 
the minds of His disciples with a rich net-work of 
associated qualities furnishing a firm support to relig- 
ious faith, and a powerful stimulus to right conduct. 
It occurs some fifteen times in the " Sermon on the 
Mount " as reported by Matthew, so that by the end of 
the Sermon, hearers must have come to the conclusion 
that the Speaker did not employ the term " Father " 
mechanically as a customary expression, but of set 
purpose and with conscious deliberate preference. It 
would be instructive to study exhaustively the settings 
of the name in the various places where it occurs. 
This cannot be done now. It must suffice to indicate 
briefly what can be learned concerning the Father in 
heaven from the most representative texts. 

Two very outstanding texts occur in the fifth Chap- 
ter, verses 16 and 45. In both the name is introduced 



142 WITH OPEN FACE 

to suggest a motive to conduct inculcated upon disci- 
ples. " Let your light shine " because thereby your 
Father will be glorified. " Love your enemies " be- 
cause by so doing you will be like your Father, who 
blesses all, evil and good, just and unjust. In this use 
of the name the nature of the Divine Fatherhood is 
supposed to be known. But the same texts may be 
utilised as an aid to the better knowledge of the 
Fatherhood. While the name suggests the mo- 
tives, the motives in turn throw light on the name. 
It is the light so thrown we are concerned with 
now. 

In the first of the two texts the motive suggested 
implies that God values the honour brought to Him by 
those who let their light shine. No man can act on 
the motive unless he believes that God is not a being 
indifferent to conduct, but rather one who takes an 
earnest interest in the moral behaviour of men. This 
then is one thing Jesus would teach when He calls God 
Father. It is His fundamental lesson connected with 
His first recorded use of the name in His public min- 
istry. He says in effect: "God is your Father, you are 
His sons, and your Father would have you behave 
worthily as His sons. He taketh pleasure in such 
behaviour not merely because of the honour it brings 
to Him through its influence on the minds of other 
men, but for its own sake. His eye rests with com- 
placency on all who acquit themselves in the world as 
true children of God." This doctrine is consonant to 
the relation between father and son. A father expects 
honour from a son and is deeply disappointed when he 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 143 

does not receive it. " If I be a Father where is mine 
honour." 1 And the honour every right-minded father 
most values is right conduct. Filial courtesies are 
well in their way, but it is character, a life true, pure, 
earnest, manly, noble, that can alone satisfy the pater- 
nal heart. Of a son living such a life, every father 
worthy of the name is proud. 

To this statement the Father in heaven is no excep- 
tion. He delights in all who in the sense of the 
Preacher let their light shine. Who then are they ? 
They are men of heroic temper ; men who love truth 
with passion and will speak it, come what may, and 
hunger after righteousness and will do it at all hazards. 
That means that they are men who have anything but 
an easy time of it in this world, whose temptation 
therefore is to hide their light and suppress their con- 
victions to escape toil and trouble. It is indeed by 
way of warning against yielding to this very tempta- 
tion that Jesus utters the counsel : " Let your light 
shine." He has just spoken in a parabolic way of 
what men do with natural lights. " Neither do men 
light a lamp and put it under the bushel " thereby 
hinting to disciples : " Put ye not your light under 
cover, set it rather on the stand, where it can be seen." 
Men are tempted to hide their light when letting it be 
seen exposes them to danger, to loss of name, property, 
or life. It is easy to show our light when it will bring 
honour and profit to ourselves. It is when there is 
neither profit nor honour going, at least for ourselves, 
that we are sorely tempted to suppress conviction and 

1 Mai. i. 6. 



144 WITH OPEN FACE 

comply tamely with evil custom. And the most pow- 
erful aid to resistance of the temptation lies in the 
knowledge that in yielding to it we miss the opportu- 
nity of glorifying our Father in heaven. For the fact 
is even so. It is one of the sure laws of the moral 
order of the world that glorifying God and self-glori- 
fication are mutually exclusive. The circumstances 
which give you the golden opportunity of glorifying 
God are just those which afford the least chance of 
obtaining immediate glory and advantage to yourself. 
Contrariwise, when you are pursuing eagerly your own 
honour and interest and succeeding very well, be sure 
that the amount of honour you bring to God is very 
insignificant. It matters not that your work is within 
the technically religious sphere, and that you pretend 
to be very zealous for God's glory. 

The moral heroes of human history, the pioneers of 
good causes, the warriors who fight a good fight for 
truth and justice, risking limb and life in the battle, 
the prophets, the martyrs, the confessors : — these are 
the men who let their light shine. These are the sons 
of God. These are the glorifiers of the Father's name, 
and in these the Father glories. Such are the men the 
Teacher on the Hill has in view throughout His dis- 
course : the men who have been persecuted for right- 
eousness sake (v. 10), the companions of persecuted 
prophets (v. 12), the men who, through no faults of 
theirs, have enemies to love, and persecutors to pray 
for (v. 44). And by using the name Father for God 
for the first time in this connection, He throws an im- 
portant light on the nature of the Divine Fatherhood, 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 145 

thereby teaching that God delights in moral heroes, 
and regards them par excellence as His children. 

This is a very noteworthy doctrine. It is, e.g., far 
in advance of that taught by Jewish doctors of the law, 
who set forth God to their disciples as one whose ap- 
proval rested on those who studied well, and carefully 
kept, all the legal traditions. What a difference, 
between the Father God of Jesus and the law-giving 
God of the Rabbis ! The God of the Rabbis demands 
justice, the God of Jesus delights in magnanimity going 
far beyond what can be legally claimed. The model 
man of legalism is one who in respect of the command- 
ments great and small (especially the small) is blame- 
less. The model man of the Teaching on the Hill is 
one who not only lives correctly, but is ready to sac- 
rifice himself for the good of others, however thank- 
less the task. Blessed of God, said the Rabbi, is the 
faultless man. Blessed of the Father in heaven said 
Jesus, is the self-sacrificing, devoted, heroic man. Note 
further how far this doctrine rises above the vulgar 
notion that God's favour is revealed by outward pros- 
perity. That view would oblige us to regard the 
noblest men that ever lived, the sages, prophets, apos- 
tles, and saviours of the race, as men accursed of God. 
Jesus has taught us a worthier way of thinking. 
" These," He says, " are the sons of God in whom He 
delights. A curse indeed rests on their life, but it is 
the curse, not of God, but of a world which in its igno- 
rance and wickedness shuns the light and resents all 
earnest attempts to establish the reign of righteousness. 
This curse rests on my own life, as will more and more 



146 WITH OPEN FACE 

clearly appear, but because I willingly bear it for the 
world's good, therefore doth my Father love me and 
account me His well-beloved Son." 

Passing to the second text we find the Fatherhood 
of God referred to in it as a motive to magnanimity. 
Here again the motive throws light on the name. Our 
inference is that magnanimity is a characteristic of 
God. But we are not left to infer this. That God 
deals magnanimously with men is expressly declared 
when it is said that " He maketh His sun rise on the 
evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and 
on the unjust." This magnanimity is an essential 
feature of the Divine Fatherhood. It is as a Father 
that God dispenses benefits to good and evil alike, 
treating good and evil, just and unjust, as His children. 
It is fatherlike thus to act. Many earthly fathers, 
certainly the best of them, so deal with their children. 
They give good gifts to all their children, not merely 
to the more exemplary with whom they are well- 
pleased. No father deals with his children on the 
principle of strict justice. Every good father does 
more for all his children than they can claim, much 
more than unworthy children deserve. It is therefore 
only in accordance with analogy that the Father in 
heaven should so act. That He does so act is familiar 
to us all. We can all testify : " He hath not dealt 
with us after our sins." 1 The least worthy have the 
best reason to know this. How much good they have 
received ; how little they have deserved ! 

Thus far as to the general import of this second 

1 Ps. ciii. 10. 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 147 

saying containing the name "Father." A little analy- 
sis may help ns to a clearer view of its full significance. 
It contains, we observe, a statement of fact and a cer- 
tain construction put on the fact. 

The fact stated is that to a large extent good comes 
to all, irrespective of character. Sun and shower repre- 
sent that common good. How much they cover ! 
From sunshine and rain duly mixed, come good crops, 
food for man and beast in abundance. That means 
general well-being, all that one could wish for a com- 
munity in the way of material prosperity. 

That the fact is as Jesus stated it, is to us self-evident. 
But it was by no means a matter of course that a Jew- 
ish teacher should have seen the fact so clearly and 
stated it so broadly. The tendency of the Hebrew 
mind was to think differently, and to regard God solely 
as a moral Governor rendering to every man according 
to his works. For men holding this view there was 
a strong temptation to force facts to square with the 
theory. Strictly carried out, that would mean the sun 
shining only on the good, the rain falling only on the 
just, or the evil and unjust getting more sunshine and 
rain than is meet, bringing dearths and deluges to pun- 
ish them for their sins. " Who," asked Eliphaz boldly, 
" who ever perished, being innocent, or when were the 
righteous cut off? Even as I have seen, they that plow 
iniquity and sow wickedness, reap the same." 1 That 
was the old theory in its baldest form. The hero of 
the poem is represented as doubting its truth. " Very 
natural, very desirable perhaps," replied he in effect, 

i Job iv. 7, 8. 



148 WITH OPEX FACE 

" but unhappily the facts do not bear your theory out.'' 
Jesus is on the side of Job. He breaks with the tradi- 
tional theory, and He does so because He has discarded 
the traditional legal conception of God as a mere Gov- 
ernor dealing with men according to strict justice. 
His mind was not dominated by current opinions or 
theories however venerable, and among the notions He 
repudiated was this one that good or ill in lot is a sure 
index of good or ill in character. He saw and said 
that this view was contradicted by two classes of facts: 
by tribulations endured by good men for righteous- 
ness' sake and by temporal prosperity enjoyed by many 
unworthy men not less, often even more, than by 
the worthy. The statement in the text about the sun 
and the rain is therefore not to be taken as a mere 
truism which any one might have spoken. It is rather 
the original utterance of one endowed with Un unbiassed 
mind, a clear vision and an unfettered tongue ; who saw 
things as they were, and fearlessly said what He saw. 

Note next the construction put upon the fact, which 
is even more characteristic. The fact being that to a 
large extent all things come alike to all, the question 
naturally obtrudes itself, what is the meaning of it ? 
Some might say: that there is no real Providence; that 
all things happen by general law acting without design 
or consciousness, that the natural order of the universe 
is perfectly indifferent to moral interests. It certainly 
seems so, insomuch that no man who holds this view 
can be easily argued out of it by an appeal to facts, 
though there are facts of human history patent to a 
wide observation which go to show that there is indeed 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 149 

a Power other than ourselves in the world making for 
righteousness. But besides this agnostic construction 
there is another which may be put on the facts, one 
harmonising with a firm faith in the living God, and 
in an intelligent Providence. We may see in the uni- 
versal boons of sun and shower the magnanimity of a 
Father treating all His children to a certain extent 
alike. 

Such was Christ's reading of the facts. As to the 
facts themselves He is at one with the unbeliever. 
The difference is wholly one of interpretation. But 
how wide the difference there ! In the same facts the 
agnostic finds no God, and no Providence, while Jesus 
finds a gracious God, and a benignant magnanimous 
Providence. Extremes meet. No God, or the highest 
kind of God, a Father ; no Providence, or a Providence 
good to all. 

These two sayings of Jesus combined give a balanced 
view of the Divine Fatherhood. Each is complemen- 
tary of the other. The one teaches that God hath a 
special paternal delight in the morally faithful, the 
other that he exercises a benignant Providence over 
all, doing good even to the morally unfaithful, His 
wayward and disobedient children. The former im- 
plies decided moral preference, the latter a sphere of 
action within which moral distinctions are overlooked. 
Either without the other is liable to run into excess. 
Moral preference tends to exclusiveness ; universal be- 
nevolence to indifferentism. Combine the two and 
both defects are eliminated. Not only so, the two con- 
trasted qualities interpenetrate and aid each other. 



150 WITH OPEN FACE 

God's moral preferences lend emphasis to His magna- 
nimity, making it appear a thing of grace and not a 
thing of course. On the other hand the Divine magna- 
nimity viewed as unmerited favour is seen to signify 
a desire that the unworthy may become true sons of 
God, objects of His complacent regard ; an invitation 
to those who are in the outer circle of sonship to press 
into the inner circle. 

Most of the other texts in the Sermon containing 
the title " Father" bear on two topics: simplicity in 
religion, and freedom from care on the part of those 
who have made the Kingdom their chief end. They 
occur in the sixth Chapter of Matthew. Spurious 
religion appears invested with two evil qualities : os- 
tentation, the vice of Pharisaism, and superstition, the 
vice of heathenism. The religion of the Pharisee, as 
manifested in almsgiving, praying and fasting, is in 
relation to men a display, in relation to God a form. 
The religion of the Pagan has for its root unbelief in 
the good-will of the gods, fear. Therefore when he 
prays he indulges in vain repetition, thinking that he 
shall be heard for his much speaking, by his battology 
compelling his god to lend a reluctant ear. The cure 
for both vices is a filial conception of God as Father. 
So Jesus hints to His disciples by the frequent intro- 
duction of the paternal title in this part of His dis- 
course. And on reflection we perceive the truth of the 
doctrine. The relation of father and son, like all inti- 
mate relations, demands, in the first place, sincere, real 
affection. Every true son cares more for the esteem 
of his father than for that of the outside world. In 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 151 

the sphere of religion this means that a true thought of 
God as Father gives the death blow to religious osten- 
tation. The filial worshipper does not care about ap- 
pearing devout to men, he seeks above all the approval 
of his heavenly Father. Then it will be impossible for 
him to mock his Father by a formal routine service in 
which there is no heart. He will offer always a wor- 
ship in which thought and feeling find utterance : an 
eloquent worship, because therein all that is within him 
speaks. 

Faith in the Divine Father is the cure for every- 
thing savouring of Pagan superstition in religion, not 
less than for Pharisaic ostentation and formalism. 
Who can indulge in vain repetition in prayer who 
believes in a Father's willing ear? More generally, 
what place for elaborate ritual of any sort in a religion 
which has for its object of worship a Father ? Simplic- 
ity is congenial to the filial spirit. And by using the 
name Father in connection with the inculcation of sim- 
plicity in prayer, Jesus would have His disciples under- 
stand that God loves simplicity. Such love pertains 
to the paternal relation. There is a place for ceremo- 
nial in the public functions of a King, but in the bosom 
of his own family the most august monarch gladly 
makes his escape from pomp and state. In this con- 
nection we perceive the significance of another Father- 
saying not contained in the Sermon on the Mount but 
kindred in spirit to those now under consideration. 
"Every plant which my heavenly Father hath not 
planted shall be rooted up." 1 The particular plant 

1 Matt. xv. 13. 



152 WITH OPEN FACE 

referred to was the tradition of the elders respecting 
ceremonial ablutions. The implied doctrine is that a 
Father God could have no hand in planting such an 
institution. His characteristic function rather is to 
eradicate everything of the kind which strikes its roots 
into the soil of man's religious nature. And the 
effectual uprooter is just the new way of thinking 
concerning God as Father. That was one of Christ's 
reasons for giving the new name so prominent a place 
in His religious vocabulary. He believed that just in 
proportion as His disciples got accustomed to a filial 
mode of conceiving God, would Rabbinical and even 
Levitical ritual lose its hold on their minds, and leave 
them free to worship the Father in spirit and in truth. 
Would that the Church in all ages had been more 
abundantly baptized into the new Divine name ! 
Then the portent of Sacramentarianism with all that 
goes along with it had never made its appearance in 
Christendom. For that also is a plant which our 
heavenly Father hath not planted. 

" Care not, your Father cares for you," said Jesus in 
effect to His disciples in that part of His discourse 
which is directed against earthly anxieties. 1 It is 
assumed that those who are thus admonished are mak- 
ing the Kingdom of God their chief end, and the aim 
is to set them free from distraction arising out of con- 
cern about food and raiment. The appositeness of the 
title "Father" applied to God in this connection is ob- 
vious. It is a father's part to provide for his children. 
By calling God Father in an exhortation against care, 

1 Matt. vi. 25-34. 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 153 

Jesus in effect teaches that God's Fatherliness includes 
providence among its attributes and functions. And if 
disciples but thoroughly believed this, it would cer- 
tainly transport them into that care-free region of 
feeling in which their Master desired them to dwell. 
He lived habitually up there Himself, without effort 
because He had an undoubting faith in a Paternal 
Providence which with unsleeping solicitude looked 
after the interests of those who with singleness of heart 
gave themselves to the service of the Kingdom How 
perfect was the peace that through this faith reigned in 
His bosom, this very admonition against care suffices to 
show. What divine serenity it breathes! And what 
simple delight in the world of nature finds expression 
in it! The careworn are so moody and gloomy that 
they have no eye for the wild flowers, and no ear for 
the song of birds, or for the music of rippling brooks or 
autumn winds. But Jesus had an eye and an ear for 
all sights and sounds of nature. " I say unto you that 
even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one 
of these." Enquire not curiously of what flower He 
spoke, as if it must needs have been some exceptionally 
lovely flower of gorgeous hue that called forth such an 
encomium. Jesus, I believe, would have said the same 
thing about the simplest wild flower that grows in the 
meadow or by the wayside : the snowdrop, the prim- 
rose, or the daisy. 

The peace Jesus Himself enjoyed He desired His 
disciples to attain, and for that end He plied them with 
arguments fitted to aid weak faith. Noteworthy are 
two drawn from human experience and put in the form 



154 WITH OPEN FACE 

of questions : " Is not the life more than meat ? " 
and " which of you by taking thought can add one cubit 
unto his stature ? " Both questions suggest an argu- 
ment from what God has done to what He may be ex- 
pected to do. What He has done is in both instances 
the greater thing, what He has yet to do the less. God 
has given to all life, a greater thing than the means of 
life, food, and raiment. The argument is : if God has 
already bestowed on us the greater boon, why doubt as 
to His continuing to give us the less, — the means of 
sustaining that life He has conferred on all as an un- 
sought blessing ? The point of the second question is 
not so obvious. It seems to hint at a form of anxiety 
which no human being ever was absurd enough to 
cherish. Who ever thought of adding to his stature 
one cubit ? Pressed by the surface difficulty many 
recent commentators have adopted the view that the 
question refers, not to increase of bodily stature, but to 
lengthening of life. The use of measures of length in 
space as symbols of length in time is not unexampled 
in Scripture. We have an instance of it in Psalm 
xxxix. 5, where, speaking of the brevity of life, the 
Psalmist says: " Behold thou hast made my days as an 
handbreadth.*' It is therefore quite conceivable that 
our Lord asked anxious-minded persons : " Which of 
you by any amount of care can add to his days a period 
of time corresponding in length to a cubit ? " It would 
have been a ver} T pertinent question, for the tendency 
of care is not to lengthen our days but rather to shorten 
them. Yet I am persuaded that this was not the 
thought Jesus meant to convey. His question refers to 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 155 

stature, and its aim is to remind the anxious that God 
has done for every man arrived at maturity what no 
man by any amount of thinking or wishing can do for 
himself. Every grown man is more than a cubit taller 
than he was as a child. The addition to his stature is 
the effect of a gradual growth going on insensibly for 
years. How unobtrusively the marvellous result was 
achieved, the process incessantly going on, but from 
day to day unobservable, perceptible only after the 
lapse of large intervals of time. The boy measures 
himself against the wall to-day, and this time next year 
he will repeat the process and find to his delight that 
he has grown one or two inches. But he had no hand 
in producing that growth, save by taking the food pro- 
vided for him by his parents and. indulging with boyish 
glee in the sports which promote growth, but have not 
growth for their conscious aim. The cubit is added in 
the care-free time of life. The boy sports and grows 
and reaches manhood with one cubit or two or even 
three added to his stature, not by him but by the laws 
of nature, or as Christ would have said by the kindness 
of His heavenly Father. And Christ's argument is : 
" If God has done that greater thing for you, rearing 
you from infancy to the stature of manhood, providing 
all the time the food necessary for growth, why doubt 
His readiness and power to find for you the needful 
sustenance now ? You did well by God's help when 
you were boys and girls, undistracted by care. Why 
not carry a little of the spirit of boyhood into your 
mature life, and, if possible, remain young-hearted all 
your days ? " 



156 WITH OPEN FACE 

We have now learned these four things regarding the 
Divine Fatherhood as defined by discriminating use in 
the hill teaching of our Lord : It implies delight in the 
noble conduct of heroic men ; magnanimous treatment 
of the unworthy ; intimate relations between God and 
men demanding from the latter sincere, simple-hearted 
religious affections ; and effective provision for the 
temporal wants of all who devote themselves to the 
higher concerns of life. This is much, but it is not 
all. We miss a cheering word about the pardon of 
sin and aid in the fight with evil. The magnanimity 
ascribed to the Divine Father might indeed be held to 
cover these needs, and it does inferentially ; yet the 
express reference of that attribute, as spoken of in the 
Sermon, is to the sunshine and the showers. Inference 
in connection with such vital matters is not enough ; 
we need positive assurance. And we have it in two 
petitions of the Pater Noster : " Forgive us our debts," 
" Deliver us from evil." By putting these petitions 
into the mouths of disciples, in a prayer addressed 
to the Father in heaven, Jesus gave them to under- 
stand that pardon of their moral shortcomings and 
power to live well were boons to be confidently expected 
from one standing to them in the relation of Father. 
His doctrine at this point also is congruous to the 
nature of Fatherhood. Every true father forgives his 
children, not once, but many times. He deals not with 
them after their sins. He also gives them all the aid he 
can to do what is right ; by prayer, wise counsel, and 
good example striving to keep their feet from evil ways. 
If God be indeed a father, He may be expected to do 



YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN 157 

likewise : not coming behind good earthly fathers, 
rather doing more for His erring children than an 
earthly parent has either the will or the power to do. 
A father on earth must sometimes stop short at mere 
desire. He cannot give his child a good spirit, or a 
holy bias, or write the law of duty on his heart. But 
the Divine Father is both able and willing. Often 
earthly fathers are lacking even in respect of good-will. 
How many of them readily conclude that the waywardness 
of a disobedient son has exceeded the limits of the for- 
givable, and harden their hearts against him ? He is a 
rare father, of phenomenally tender heart, who can fitly 
represent in his parental conduct the mercy of God. 
Jesus has drawn his picture in the parable of the Prodi- 
gal Son. Why does that picture affect us so power- 
fully ? Because it tells us fathers what Ave ought to 
be, but are not. It is a poetic ideal, far transcending 
the reality of ordinary family life. Jesus drew that pa- 
thetic picture that we might know that what for many 
of us is merely ideal is real for God. " God," He would 
teach, " behaves so towards His returning prodigal chil- 
dren. Judge Him not by yourselves. His ways are 
hot your ways." In that beautiful parable, the doctrine 
of Jesus concerning the Fatherhood of God in the moral 
sphere reaches its climax. It is the best concrete com- 
mentary on the abstract general petition : " Forgive us 
our debts. " Who without such a pictorial representation 
of Divine forgiveness would have the courage to think 
that even God could pardon in that magnificent way ? 

And yet there is greater magnificence behind all that. 
Nothing more generous and handsome can be conceived 



158 WITH OPEN FACE 

than the reception given by the father to the prodigal 
on his arrival. But what if he had gone in quest of the 
wanderer as the shepherd went in quest of the straying 
sheep, enduring the hardships of the long way, and the 
miseries of the famine-stricken land, and, finding the lost 
one there, had claimed him as his son, and by moving 
entreaties induced him to return home ? That would 
have been a deeper depth of pity, and a pardon costing 
the pardoner more. It is no fault of the parable that it 
leaves this phase of fatherly love out of the picture. 
Room had to be made for the free-play of penitence, the 
lost one in this case being not a sheep but a man. For 
in the human sphere finding means self -fin ding, — com- 
ing to oneself in contrite reflection. But the seeking and 
the suffering connected therewith have their place here 
also. The Son of man came to seek the lost. In Him, 
if He be Divine, the Father came to seek the lost. Patri- 
passianism is not wholly a heresy. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE WORTH OF MAN 

Jesus believed in the absolute infinite worth of man 
taken even at the lowest and meanest. But He did not 
express His faith in philosophical terms like infinite and 
absolute. He used the method of comparison. Once 
He employed a comparison which adequately embodied 
His idea: " What is a man profited if he shall gain the 
whole world and lose his own soul. Or what shall a 
man give in exchange for his soul ? " 1 " Christ's maxim 
is: one soul outweighs the world." But usually He 
dealt in comparisons which seem utterly inadequate, 
as when in the admonition against care He asked 
anxious disciples : " Are ye not much better than 
they? " i.e., than the fowls of the air. 2 Similarly in a 
discourse on apostolic tribulations, to keep the Twelve 
in good heart, He said: "Fear ye not therefore, ye are 
of more value than many sparrows." 3 Comparisons at 
the best can never express absolute truth. To say that 
one thing is better than another, however good the lat- 
ter may be, does not amount to saying that it is the best 
possible. But when the object whose value is being 

1 Matt. xvi. 26. 2 Matt. vi. 2G. 3 Matt. x. 31. 

159 



160 WITH OPEN FACE 

estimated is compared with something of recognised 
standard worth, " better" practically means "best." 
So for example in the Epistle to the Hebrews. There 
also the method of comparison is used to set forth the 
excellence of the Christian religion. The writer's 
position really is : Christianity the best possible relig- 
ion, the absolutely perfect, therefore the final form, of 
man's relation with God. But he puts that position 
in this way: Christianity better than the Old-Testa- 
ment religion with all its agents and agencies of revela- 
tion and redemption. Practically it amounted to the 
same thing, because for the Hebrew Christians, for whose 
benefit the comparison was made, the ancient religion of 
the Jewish people, with its Moses and Aaron and Le- 
vitical rites, was a sacred divine institution. But " of 
more value than many sparrows," which have almost no 
worth at all, — that is surely not saying much ! Yet in 
the very inadequacy of the comparison lies its pathos 
and its power as addressed to men who have a depress- 
ing sense of their own insignificance. Persons in this 
state of mind need such humble estimates to help them 
to rise to higher faith and bolder self-respect, and the 
use of them by Jesus is signal proof of His deep sym- 
pathy, as of His poetic tact and felicity. I value greatly 
these simple naive questions of Jesus preserved for us 
in the synoptic gospels, as a contribution to His doctrine 
of man. There is nothing like them elsewhere in the 
New Testament; nothing so expressive and impressive, 
so suggestive, so humanely sympathetic, so quietly yet 
severely condemnatory of all low unloving estimates of 
human worth. Compare with these questions of Jesus 



THE WORTH OF MAN 161 

St. Paul's: "Doth Gocl take care for oxen?" 1 Jesus 
could not have asked that question with an implied 
negative in His mind. His doctrine was: "God does 
take care even for oxen, but for men more." 

These simple kindly comparisons by which our Lord 
sought to indoctrinate His disciples in the worth of 
man to God suggest more than they say, and provoke 
far-reaching reflections. Better than sparrows, than 
all fowls of the air, than a sheep, 2 or an ox. 3 How? 
Not in all respects. Man cannot fly like the birds, or 
sing like the lark, or furnish material that can be manu- 
factured into cloth like the sheep, or bear heavy burdens 
like the ox. The ground of his superiority is not physi- 
cal but spiritual. He can think and love, and act with 
freedom. In these respects he is unique, simply incom- 
parable with "birds and fourfooted beasts," and not 
merely with them, but with the entire subrational 
universe. The principle involved in our Lord's 
question: " Are ye not much better than they " is that 
man, as a rational being and moral personality, is of 
more value than the whole inanimate and lower ani- 
mate world. This is an essential principle in the 
Christian theory of the universe. And it is a principle 
which the most recent science amply justifies. The 
evolutionary conception of the process by which the 
world as it now is came into being, places man at the 
head of the creation. It assigns him this position just 
in proportion as it brings his whole nature, on its 
spiritual not less than on its physical side, Avithin the 
scope of evolutionary law. When the scientist says : 
1 1 Cor. ix. 10. 2 v atL x ii. 12. 3 L u / ce x \ Vt 5. 

M 



162 WITH OPEN FACE 

Man in his intellect and in his moral nature, as well as 
in his body, has been evolved, he declares in effect that 
man in his composite being is the crown and climax of 
the grand movement by which the present universe, 
with its endless variety of existences, has slowly 
emerged out of the primitive chaos of homogeneous 
matter. That being so, it follows of necessity that man 
is a being of unique significance. He is the key to the 
meaning of the universe and to the nature of its Maker. 
He is the end the Creator had in view in making the 
world. Till man arrives on the scene, one feels tempted 
to ask: To what purpose these stars, mountains, rocks, 
rivers, plains, and plants and animals of all sorts and 
sizes ? When he makes his appearance, one begins to 
see that it was worth while to make a world. And one 
also begins to understand the nature of the Maker. He 
is, we see, one who has been working all through the 
ages towards the production of rational and moral 
beings. And hence we infer that He is Himself 
rational and moral. And as the Maker of the world 
had man in view as the raison d'etre of world-making, it 
stands to reason that He will care for man after He has 
in the fulness of the time brought him into existence. 
He will see to it that all the rational and moral possibili- 
ties of this new type of being shall be realised, and will 
make all nature's laws and all events co-operate towards 
this end. In other words, A Kingdom of God, with 
good men for its citizens, will be God's own chief end, 
directing and controlling the whole course of His prov- 
idence. 

This is a great bold thought which the hand of even 



THE WORTH OF MAN 163 

strong faith cannot at first grasp without trembling. 
Yet it is easier to believe that God thinks thus highly of 
man than for man himself to cherish such thoughts 
of his kind. Rather I should say that the main cause 
of unbelief in God's care for man is the low estimate 
men form of human nature in themselves and in others. 
Contempt of the human, whencesoever arising, is a fruit- 
ful cause of practical Atheism. Who can believe that 
God careth for men, who does not himself believe that a 
man is better than a sheep ? And who are they who are 
guilty of scepticism so radical ? Well, various sorts of 
people. Philosophers, e.g., like Celsus, who deliberately 
maintained that man is no better than a beast, and that 
he is surpassed by some animals even in respect of 
morality and religion. Commercial men, also, who 
measure the worth of all things by their value as prop- 
erty. My sheep belongs to me, and I can sell it for so 
much, but that drunken good-for-nothing, what have I 
to do with him ? He is not my slave, and even if he 
were, nobody would buy him. Even religious men 
have needed to be reminded of the worth of man as 
man. How much is a man better than a sheep ? was 
a question addressed by our Lord to Pharisees. They 
really did not believe anything of the kind. They had 
got into a way of setting the human and the divine in 
antagonism. They made man the slave of the sabbatli 
law in zeal for the supposed honour of the Divine Law- 
giver. A sheep was a creature to be envied by com- 
parison, as in virtue of its very irrationality lying 
outside the scope of the vexatious statute. For an 
analogous reason, they would not feel the force of the 



164 WITH OPEN FACE 

parable of the Lost Sheep. Yes, they would say within 
themselves, we can understand a shepherd going after 
a strayed sheep and rejoicing when he found it. It 
belonged to him, and moreover it was blameless. But 
these publicans and sinners belong neither to you nor 
to us, and if they are lost it is their own fault, let them 
take the consequences. 

In view of this inhuman type of religion then preva- 
lent in Palestine, one can appreciate the startling sig- 
nificance of Christ's own bearing towards the neglected 
classes. It was nothing short of revolutionary. It 
would stimulate thought on the question : What is the 
worth of man even at the worst, far more powerfully 
than any number of mild suggestions as to man being 
better than this or that member of the lower animal 
creation. These might provoke from unsympathetic 
hearers a sceptical smile, but the mission to the out- 
casts of Capernaum provoked indignation, as against one 
who had committed a wanton outrage on the moral 
feelings of a God-fearing community. " Think of such 
scandalous people being treated even as iellow-men, not 
to say as comrades, admitted to social privilege on equal 
terms! " The rude shock to the sense of propriety is the 
measure of the innovation inaugurated, and of the 
extent to which the contemporary world needed educa- 
tion in the elementary rights and claims of man. As 
the teacher of a new doctrine on this subject, Jesus 
could not get .past that Capernaum mission and all that 
went along with it. The holy rage of religionists was 
no doubt a regrettable circumstance, but unfortunately 
radical reforms cannot be brought about in this world 



THE WORTH OF MAN 165 

without rude initial shocks to prejudice. " Woe unto 
the world because of offences," 1 but blessing also comes 
through them. Outrage to rooted caste pride first, and 
it may be fierce war in defence of cherished prerogative ; 
then ultimate acceptance of a beneficent moral axiom 
which to disinterested wise humane men was self- 
evident from the first. Thank God for the men who 
bring this kind of offences. They are the world's 
benefactors and saviours, at a great cost to themselves. 
For woe is to that man by whom even the beneficent 
offence cometh. The world calls him evil names, and is 
not content till it has got rid of him. But he leaves 
his blessing behind him in the form of a truth that up- 
sets partition walls, fills up gulfs of social cleavage, 
banishes the kingdoms of the wild beast type and 
ushers in the Kingdom of the human. 

So did Jesus Christ teach His new doctrine concern- 
ing the worth of man by quaint pathetic comparisons, 
and by aggressive action which compelled all to take 
note that in His judgment a man was a man, even 
though a publican and a " sinner." He crowned the 
doctrine by the name He assumed for Himself : Son of 
man. This name Jesus nowhere formally defines, any 
more than He defines the name He gave to God. In 
this case, as in that, He defines only by discriminating 
use. We must listen attentively as He calls Himself 
Son of man, and strive to catch the sense of the title 
from the tone and accent of the Speaker. To do this 
successfully needs a sensitive sympathetic ear, unfilled 
with other sounds that blunt its perceptive faculty. 

1 Matt, xviii. 7. 



166 WITH OPEN FACE 

Lacking such an ear, men may get very false impres- 
sions, and read all sorts of meanings into the simple 
phrase, collected perhaps from Old Testament texts, or 
suggested by systems of theology. To my ear the 
title speaks of one who is sympathetic and unpreten- 
tious ; loves men and advances no ambitious claims. 
He may be great, so to speak, in spite of Himself, by 
gifts and graces even unique, but these must speak for 
themselves. He will not take pains to point them out, 
or advertise His importance as their possessor. The 
Son of man wears no grand airs, but is meek and lowly. 
He is simply the Man, the brother of men ; loving 
humanity with a passionate love which fits Him to be 
the world's Christ, but His personal attitude is that 
of one who says : " Discover what is deepest in me, 
and draw your own inference." 

Specially instructive is the earliest instance of the 
use of this title by our Lord, occurring in the First 
Gospel. Matthew introduces it for the first time in 
connection with the offer of a scribe to become a 
disciple. 1 The incident is recorded both by Matthew 
and by Luke, 2 but in neither Gospel is there any clear 
indication of its true historical setting. We may 
assume that it happened after the attitude of the class 
to which the aspirant belonged, towards Jesus, had 
been made manifest, and that the reception given to 
the would-be disciple was influenced by Christ's prac- 
tical acquaintance with that class. Were we to take 
as our guide Luke, who introduces the aspirant simply 
as a certain person, we should of course lay no stress 
1 Matt. viii. 19, 20. 2 Luke ix. 57, 58. 



THE WORTH OF MAN 167 

on the indication of his profession given in the narra- 
tive of Matthew. But that a scribe should offer to 
become a disciple was so unlikely, that no reason can 
be assigned for its place in the tradition, save that it 
was a fact. And just because it was unlikely, we are 
entitled to treat the fact as important, and to interpret 
in the light of it both the name Jesus gave Himself, 
and the repellent word He addressed to the candidate 
for discipleship. 

Taking the latter first, when we remember to whom 
Jesus is speaking it becomes probable that the saying : 
" Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have lodging- 
places, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay His 
head " is to be taken parabolically. That is to say, it 
refers to Christ's spiritual situation as one who has no 
home for His soul' in the religion of the time, rather 
than to His physical condition, as one at the moment 
without any certain dwelling-place. Though this view 
suggested itself to my mind only recently, I confess 
that I have always felt a certain measure of dissatis- 
faction with the current conception of our Lord's mean- 
ing. I have never been able to see any special aptitude 
of the saying, so understood, to the case of the person 
addressed, nor have I been able to get rid of the feeling 
that the word taken in the literal sense is not without 
a certain tone of exaggerated sentiment, according ill 
with the known character of Jesus. There does not 
seem to have been any great hardship in the physical 
aspect of the life of our Lord and His disciples, such 
as might scare away any one the least inclined to disciple 
life. And suppose this aspirant had been admitted to 



168 WITH OPEX FACE 

the ranks of discipleship, would he not have been one 
more added to the number of followers possessing 
means sufficient to make the daily life of the Jesus- 
circle not without a due measure of comfort. 1 On 
these grounds the suggestion that the saving about the 
foxes and the birds is to be interpreted parabolically 
came to my mind as a relief. Looked at in this light it 
is seen to be at once very true, and very apposite. How 
thoroughly true that Jesus was spiritually an alien, 
without a home in the religion of the time ! Recall all 
that quite probably had happened before this incident 
took place : the charge of blasphemy in connection 
with the healing of the palsied man, the offence taken 
at the festive meeting with the publicans, and the 
scandalous charges that grew out of that event, the 
numerous conflicts respecting Sabbath keeping, fasting, 
ritual ablutions, and the like, the infamous suggestion 
that the cure of demoniacs was wrought by the aid of 
Beelzebub, and so on. If the whole, or even a part of 
these experiences lay behind Him when he uttered this 
word, with what truth and pathos Jesus might say : 
The foxes and the birds of the air are better of! than I 
am, so far as a home for the soul is concerned. Then 
with what point and pungency He might say this to a 
scribe ! For was it not the class the aspirant belonged 
to that made Him homeless ? Whether viewed as an 
excuse for reluctance to receive him as a disciple, or as 
a summons to deliberate consideration of what was 

1 Vide Luke viii. 1-3, which 'Wendt regards as a kind of introduc- 
tion to the passage about the three aspirants, Lake ix. 57-62, as it 
stood in the book of Logia. 



THE WORTH OF MAN 169 

involved in the step he was proposing to take, the 
word was altogether seasonable. In the one case it 
meant : You need not wonder if I give not a prompt 
warm welcome to you, remembering all that has passed 
between me and the class you belong to. In the other 
case it means : consider how it is with me ; I am a 
religious outlaw, suspected, hated, a fugitive from 
those who seek my life. Are you really able to break 
with your class in opinion, feeling, and interest, and to 
bear the obloquy and ill-will that will inevitably come 
upon you as my disciple ? 

Let us turn now to this title " Son of man," which 
we meet with here for the first time in Matthew's 
Gospel, and enquire what view of its import is most 
naturally suggested by the situation of Jesus as para- 
bolically described, and by the religious connections of 
the party addressed. We may assume that, as in all 
cases probably more or less, so very specially in this 
case, the title was used significantly, and not merely 
from custom. It served, that is to say, as a symbol of 
the religious attitude of Jesus, and as a protest against 
the antagonistic attitude of the scribes. Wherein then 
did the difference between the two attitudes lie? It 
might be summed up in these two particulars. First, 
the religion of the scribes was inhuman ; it posited an 
artificial false antithesis between the divine and the 
human interest. Second, it was ambitious. The spirit 
of pride and self-importance pervaded it throughout. 
This spirit found expression in the Messianic idea of 
the scribes, as in all other parts of their system. Only 
a Messiah coming with worldly pomp would please 



170 WITH OPEN FACE 

them. He must come as the Son of some great One, 
and be in all things like His descent. We quite 
understand how when Jesus asked the Pharisees (in 
spirit identical with the scribes) : What think ye con- 
cerning' the Christ? whose Son is he? the}' were so 
ready with the answer: The Son of David. 1 That was 
the essential point for them. Davidic descent before 
all things, everything else subordinate and conforming 
thereto. 

At both points Jesus stood in irreconcilable antago- 
nism to the scribes. He was emphatically, passionately 
human, and He was humble. In His whole public 
career, by every word and act, He was ever saying in 
effect: " I stand for the human, not as opposed to the 
divine, but as ultimatel}" identical with it. I am jeal- 
ous for God's honour, and just on that account I 
champion the interest of man. For I find in this land 
among those who make themselves prominent in 
religion a spurious zeal for the divine whose practical 
issue is immorality and inhumanity. They encourage 
men to say ' Corban,' and so excuse themselves for neg- 
lecting the duties of filial piety. 2 They interpret the 
Sabbath law of rest so strictly as to make it wrong for 
a man to satisfy hunger by rubbing a few ears of corn 
in his hands, 3 or to heal a sick man on the seventh day, 
so bringing the Fourth Commandment into needless 
conflict with the higher law of mercy. Therefore I 
make it my business to emphasise the neglected inter- 
est, not in a onesided way or in the spirit of mere 
reaction, but as the best way of guarding that very 
1 Matt. xxii. 42. 2 Matt. xv. 5. 3 Matt. xii. 1-8. 



THE WORTH OF MAN 171 

divine interest of which they have constituted them- 
selves the patrons." The contrast in the other respect 
was not less glaring. The scribes loved titles of hon- 
our. They desired to be called of men Rabbi. 1 It 
gratified their vanity and proclaimed their importance 
as men who knew the law and the traditional inter- 
pretation of it current in the schools. Jesus had noth- 
ing in common with them here. He set no value on 
complimentary epithets, or on any expressions of 
respect towards Himself, except in so far as they repre- 
sented intelligent and sincere conviction. He declined 
even to be called " good " in the way of compliment by 
one who came to Him enquiring the way to Eternal 
Life. 2 His aversion to everything savouring of vanity, 
ostentation, self-importance and self-advertisement was 
austere and unconquerable. He prayed not at the 
street corner, but amid the solitude of the mountains 
when men were asleep. He withdrew into the wilder- 
ness from popular admiration. He enjoined on His 
disciples to tell no man that He was the Christ. 

The title " Son of man " as used in the reply to the 
scribe was a compendious proclamation of this twofold 
antagonism. It said these two things : Son of man 
in my religious tendency, zealous for the human; Son 
of man in my estimate of myself, as opposed to son of 
David, the attractive title for those who desire a 
Messiah harmonising with vain thoughts. Charged 
with such significance it set very fully before the scribe 
the grave import of the step he proposed to take in 
becoming a disciple. That, we now clearly under- 
1 Matt, xxiii. 7. 2 Mark x. 17. 



172 WITH OPEN FACE 

stand, did not lie in entering on a life of physical 
hardship. It rather lay in this : that the aspirant to 
diseipleship was called upon to abandon forever Rab- 
binical ways of thinking, and to adopt as his leader 
one who could make no response to current Messianic 
hopes. What happened? We are not told, but we 
are apt to take for granted that of course the scribe 
turned away from a Master who seemed so cynically 
indifferent to his approaches. Indeed we are inclined 
to wonder how a scribe could ever think of becoming a 
disciple of Jesus, even if he possessed only a moderate 
acquaintance with His character, and are tempted to 
suspect that in connecting the aspirant with this class, 
the evano-elic tradition is at fault. But it has to be 
remembered that the class-spirit does not dominate all 
the members of a fraternity to a uniform extent, and 
that Mark tells of a scribe who had considerable sym- 
pathy with the ideas of Jesus, and whom Jesus 
regarded with much interest as one not far from the 
Kingdom of God. 1 It takes time for a human soul to 
be made an abject willing slave of a pernicious relig- 
ious system, and in the case of not a few young men of 
ingenuous spirit and somewhat robust moral senti- 
ments, the process is a species of martyrdom. There 
were doubtless among the scholars of the scribes some 
whose better nature revolted against the doctrines thev 
were beingr taugfht. Such malcontents would steal 
away now and then from the school to hear the new 
Preacher, as young men and women in our cities now 
steal away from orthodox churches to hear some charm- 

1 Mark xii. 28-34. 



THE WORTH OF MAN 173 

ing heretic. And of course these runaways felt the 
spell of Him who taught "not as the scribes." What 
wonder if one at least bethought himself of breaking 
away from their dominion and joining the society of 
the Great Proscribed? 

I have discussed at some length this first text in 
Matthew's Gospel containing the title " Son of man " 
because of the light which, in virtue of its setting 
there, it throws on the strong convictions of our Lord 
concerning the significance of man. My present aim 
is not to discuss the import of the title for its own sake, 
but simply in connection with what I regard as a wider 
and more important question : What Jesus thought 
of the race with which He so emphatically identified 
Himself. But I may say that I regard it as a happy 
circumstance that just this particular text is the first 
containing the title which we encounter in perusing 
the records of our Lord's ministry. For it is not only 
the first, but the most luminous. The title scribe given 
to the aspirant furnishes the key to the title Son of 
man assumed by the Master. And the meaning struck 
out of the latter like a spark out of steel by the stroke 
of a flint, is in turn the key to its meaning in some 
other texts where its sense is often misapprehended. 
For example in the text : " The Son of man is Lord 
even of the Sabbath day." * The title here is not to 
be charged with all sorts of theological meanings, such 
as the " ideal Man," or the Man who while human is 
more, even Divine, or the Messiah invested with full 
Messianic prerogative. It is not yet become a stereo- 

1 Matt. xii. 8. 



174 WITH OPEN FACE 

typed phrase, a vox signata; it is a phrase whose mean- 
ing is fluid, used with conscious significance, and with 
strict relevance to the context. And the connection 
requires that, as in the text we have so fully consid- 
ered, it should be taken as meaning, " the Man who 
stands for the human interest as distinct from the sup- 
posed divine interest." Christ's whole thought is : 
"the Sabbath was made for man, not (as you think) 
man for the Sabbath ; therefore I who make it my busi- 
ness to vindicate the claims of the neglected human, 
am the best judge of how the Sabbath is to be 
observed. I have no desire to set it aside, for as God 
meant it, it is a beneficent institution ; but I wish and 
intend to restore to it its true place and function as 
having for its end man's good." So again in the text 
" Whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man 
it shall be forgiven ; but whosoever speaketh against 
the Holy Ghost it shall not be forgiven him." 1 The 
idea is not : blasphemy against the Son of man comes 
next to blasphemy against the Holy Ghost in heinous- 
ness, and therefore is barely forgivable. So under- 
stood it takes its place in a climax thus : blasphemy 
against ordinary men forgivable of course, blasphemy 
against the extraordinary ideal man barely forgivable, 
blasphemy against the Holy Ghost not forgivable at 
all. The meaning rather is : blasphemy against the 
Son of man shall be forgiven just as blasphemous 
words against any son of man may be forgiven. If it 
be asked why the Son of man and sons of men in gen- 
eral are put on a level, we shall get light by reflecting 

1 Matt. xii. 32. 



THE WORTH OF MAN 175 

on the source of the blasphemy against the Son of 
man. The main source of the blasphemies against the 
Son of man, in matter of fact, was just that He stood so 
stoutly for the human. He identified Himself with 
neglected, outraged human interests, and He suffered 
in name and fame in consequence, and He was content 
to do so, and took it all as a matter of course, and 
regarded it as in most cases the result of a very par- 
donable misunderstanding. He associated with publi- 
cans and sinners, and they called Him a drunkard, a 
glutton, and a philo-publican. 1 He healed on the Sab- 
bath day, and they called Him a Sabbath-breaker. He 
cheered the heart of the palsied man by proclaiming 
the forgiveness of sins, and they called Him a blas- 
phemer. 2 He allowed a sinful woman to touch His 
person, and it was inferred that if He was a good man 
He at all events could not be a prophet. 3 He pitied 
the poor demoniacs and restored them to health and 
sanity, and they said " He is in league with Beelze- 
bub." It is true that in this last instance He did not 
take the blasphemy as a matter of course, but made it 
the subject of grave animadversion, as if it bordered 
on the unpardonable. But why so? Simply because 
He found it impossible to believe that in this case as 
in most of the others just enumerated, it was the result 
of a pardonable misunderstanding. He did not at all 
wonder that men misjudged Him when they saw Him 
associating with the social pariahs. Fellowship with 
such for their moral rescue was so new a thing, and 
fellowship with them from love of their evil ways so 
1 Matt. xi. 19. 2 Matt. ix. 2-3. s Lake vii. 39. 



176 WITH OPEN FACE 

much the rule, that misconception could hardly fail to 
arise. The calumniated one, even in that case, might 
have his own suspicions as to the real sources of the 
calumny ; but the presumption was against Him, and 
He was silent. It was the penalty He had to pay for 
doing a daring thing at the bidding of an unexampled 
love and value for man, even at the worst. But in the 
case of the Beelzebub-hypothesis the position was dif- 
ferent. The demoniacs were not regarded with moral 
aversion like the publicans and "sinners." They were 
not immoral, but simply unhappy sufferers under some 
supernatural influence of a malignant type. Men re- 
garded them with feelings kindred to those we cherish 
towards the insane. Pity for them, therefore, even if 
unusual in degree, offered no occasion for sinister 
remark. That one tried to cure them could not legiti- 
mately expose to suspicion, for such attempts were not 
uncommon in unsuspected quarters. The offence of 
Jesus in this instance Avas not His pity, nor His effort 
to succour, but His signal success. That made Him 
famous and popular, therefore it had to be explained 
away, or, if the fact could not be denied, its character 
had to be somehow blackened. The Beelzebub-hypoth- 
esis was invented for this purpose. The inventors had 
no faith in it themselves ; they simply hoped that it 
would throw dust in the eyes of an admiring populace. 
And that was why their sin appeared to Jesus so 
serious. It was not in His view a sin of misunder- 
standing against the Son of man arising out of His 
identifying Himself with novel or unpopular human- 
ities, but a sin against knowledge committed by men 



THE WORTH OF MAN 177 

who would say and do anything rather than admit that 
any good was to be found in Him. 

I do not forget that the title " Son of man " has 
another side, an apocalyptic sense connecting it with 
the visions of Daniel, and with the glories of the sec- 
ond advent. But even on that side it is not divorced 
from the radical sense of standing for the human. 
Daniel's Kingdom of one like unto a Son of man is 
a Kingdom of the human as distinct from Kingdoms 
of the brutal type symbolised by wild beasts, — lion, 
bear, leopard, or other unnamed monster more hideous 
and ferocious than the rest. The Kingdom of the 
human came to its rights in the teaching and ministry 
of Jesus, and this constitutes His best claim to be the 
Christ, not mere physical descent from David, though 
that, as the genealogies attest, may have been a fact. 
And whatever apocalyptic glories may be in store for 
the Son of man, they will never be such as to put Him 
out of conceit with the humanities He inaugurated, 
or divorce His celestial life from His life on earth. 
The Son of man who returns to this world, accom- 
panied by a royal escort of angels, to take His seat as 
judge of men, does not forget His state of humiliation 
or the classes of which that state made Him a fellow. 
He judges men by the way in which they treat the 
classes who are lightly esteemed, and whom He still 
accounts His brethren. The glorified Son of man, in 
the teaching of Jesus, is still the man who stands for 
the human, whose heart burns with the "enthusiasm 
of humanity," and His decisive test of character is the 
relation in which men stand to that sacred passion. 



178 WITH OPEN FACE 

Does it burn in their hearts, then they are the children 
of the Father. Are they inhuman, then their place 
cannot be in the Kingdom prepared by the Father for 
those who with heart and soul have practised the 
humanities. 1 

Christ's doctrine of man is grand, and still at the 
end of nineteen centuries stands above Christendom 
a lofty unreached ideal. And what shall we say of 
Him who taught it, not by word only, but still more 
emphatically by deed ? Surely that He has earned the 
Eternal honour of all who seek the good of their kind. 
With open face we see " the Saviour and the Friend of 
man," and His teaching and His example are the in- 
spiration of all who desire to leave the world better 
than they found it. 

i Matt. xxv. 31-46. 



CHAPTER X 

THE MORAL IDEAL 

On the subject of the worth of man, which occupied 
our attention in the last chapter, the Teaching on the 
Hill gave us rather our key-note, or starting-point, than 
full materials for a detailed statement. u Are ye not 
much better than they?" was its solitary but most 
suggestive contribution. It is otherwise with the 
present topic, the doctrine of the moral ideal or of 
the true righteousness of the Kingdom. That may 
be said to be the theme of the instruction communi- 
cated to disciples on the mountain-top. From begin- 
ning to end the Teacher is engaged in answering the 
question : How do you conceive human conduct in 
relation to God and men, how, e.g., in comparison 
with Rabbinical or Pharisaic teachers, whom we have 
heard you occasionally criticise ? If they are wrong, 
what is right ? That was a question sure to be asked 
by disciples of the " labouring and heavy laden " type ; 
and, even if there were none such in the actual disciple- 
circle, the Master would find it necessary, in order to 
do justice to His own conception of the true life, to 
take an opportunity of dealing with the problem, time 
and place being convenient. No better time can be 

179 



180 WITH OPEN FACE 

thought of than in the middle period of our Lord's 
public career, after the synagogue ministry in Galilee 
was over, and before the last months when the final 
crisis was in view, and self-sacrifice became the pressing 
topic of the hour ; and no better place than a mountain 
retreat affording the necessary detachment, and favour- 
able to the didactic mood. 

In Matthew's report of Christ's Teaching on the 
Hill, His doctrine of Righteousness is cast into the 
form of a contrast between His own ideas on the sub- 
ject and those current among " the scribes and Phari- 
sees." This was the most natural method to employ 
in the circumstances. The righteousness of the scribes 
was an obtrusive fact familiar to all. It had to be 
reckoned with by one proposing to give a course of 
instruction in religion and morals, and a teacher could 
most easily and clearly communicate to his scholars 
precise ideas of his own views on these topics by col- 
lating them with a conflicting system widely preva- 
lent. This polemic, the larger part of the discourse, 
disappears in the pages of Luke, where the Teaching 
on the Hill assumes the form of a sermon to an ideal 
Christian congregation, mainly Gentile in its compo- 
sition, and therefore supposed to have no practical in- 
terest in controversial references to the opinions of the 
Jewish contemporaries of the Saviour. This omission 
was perfectly natural, however it came about, whether 
through a gradual transformation in the tradition be- 
fore it reached Luke's hands, or by the exercise of 
editorial discretion on the part of the Evangelist him- 
self. But it would be a great mistake to suppose that 



THE MORAL IDEAL 181 

those Christians who knew the Teaching on the Hill 
only through Luke's narrative lost nothing of perma- 
nent didactic value. For in truth the large section 
omitted, while polemical in form, is essentially a body 
of most valuable positive instruction as to the nature 
of true righteousness. Even the polemical element is 
not to be despised as of purely antiquarian character, 
or at best as possessing merely historical interest, in 
so far as it gives us some information concerning the 
religious opinions and practices of the scribes and 
Pharisees. It contains Christ's negative doctrine of 
righteousness, setting forth in very explicit terms what 
righteousness is not. But if the polemical form be dis- 
tasteful to us, we can easily strip it off, which done, 
there will still remain an unmutilated, perennially 
valid account of what, in the mind of our Lord Jesus, 
true righteousness really is. 

Our Lord's doctrine of righteousness here, as through- 
out the Evangelic Records, is dominated by the concep- 
tion of God as Father. The righteousness inculcated 
is distinctively filial. In Christ's system of religious 
thought there were three ideas of cardinal importance, 
and so related to each other that once you are ac- 
quainted with any one of them you can determine for 
yourself the import of the other two. The three ideas 
were represented by the three great words, Kingdom, 
Father, Righteousness. Suppose you begin your studies 
with the word " Father," and ascertain by an induc- 
tive examination of the various texts in which it 
occurs what it signified as discriminatingly used by 
Jesus ; then you can determine almost without de- 



182 WITH OPEX FACE 

tailed enquiry, by deduction, what " Kingdom " and 
"Righteousness" on His lips must mean. The King- 
dom will signify : God obtaining sovereign influence 
over human hearts by paternal love, in virtue of which 
He calls all men, even the basest, His sons, freely par- 
dons their offences, and invites them to participate in 
fullest family privilege and fellowship. And the right- 
eousness of the Kingdom will be that of men who stand 
to God in the relation of sons, and to fellow-men in the 
relation of brethren. The whole doctrine of right- 
eousness will be capable of being summarily compre- 
hended in these two precepts : Be to God all that a 
son should be to a father, Treat fellow-men as breth- 
ren. As a matter of fact, all the special injunctions 
contained in the Sermon on the Mount can easily be 
brought under one or other of these heads. It may be 
worth while to take a cursory glance at the legislative 
programme by way of verifying this statement. 

The first precept of the Master is, " Let your light 
shine." That means, as we have already ascertained, 
seek your Father's honour. Picking out the precepts 
in the sequel belonging to the same category, — viz., 
duty to God, — we come next to that contained in 
Chap. V. 45-48, the gist of which is : imitate the 
character of the Divine Father, even in its most sub- 
lime virtues, such as magnanimity. Passing into the 
sixth chapter, we meet with an admonition to shun 
vulgar ostentation, religious parade, in almsgiving, 
fasting, praying, with insatiable appetite for the good 
opinion of men, — which, translated into non-contro- 
versial terms, means : value supremely, if not solely, 



THE MORAL IDEAL 183 

the judgment of the Father in heaven, who looks 
into the heart of things, and not merely at the sur- 
face. 1 Then follows a counsel concerning prayer, 
whose import is, cherish towards God as your Father 
sincere reverence, manifesting itself in devout adora- 
tion and lowly yet confiding petitions. 2 Then finally, 
in the close of the same chapter, comes the injunction 
to make the Kingdom of the Father, the divine inter- 
est in the world, the chief end of life, with single- 
hearted devotion, and with absolute freedom from 
care about personal concerns, trusting implicitly in the 
heavenly Father's ever-watchful and faithful provi- 
dence. 3 

Turning now to those precepts which come under 
the second general category, duty to men, we find first 
a precept attaching itself to the sixth commandment : 
Thou shalt not kill. Christ's injunction virtually is : 
Be not content with merely not killing a fellow-man ; 
cherish towards him, as a brother, a love which shall 
make it impossible to hate him or despise him. 4 At 
this point the doctrine of the Master is full of local 
colouring, with Hebrew words such as Raca, and refer- 
ences to Jewish tribunals, investing it with a foreign, 
far-off aspect, and depriving it apparently of universal 
value. But it is only the shell that is temporary, the 
kernel is perennial. Nothing is more characteristic of 
the great Master than the way in which He classes the 
degrees of guilt in connection with the various offences 
against the law of brotherly love. He treats sins 

1 Matt. vi. 1-6, 16-18. 2 Matt. vi. 7-15. 

3 Matt. vi. 25-34. 4 Matt. v. 21-24. 



184 WITH OPEN FACE 

seemingly trivial, such as calling a man names, as more 
heinous than offences committed in a passion of rage. 
The reason is that the former imply cold contempt, 
more inhuman than anger which prompts to acts often 
bitterly regretted as soon as the hot temper cools down. 
Raca expresses contempt for a man's head = you stupid! 
More, fool, contempt for his heart or character = you 
scoundrel. Very notable likewise is the counsel to the 
man who is at variance with a brother, to give the work 
of reconciliation precedence of sacrifice. Whether it 
formed part of the Teaching on the Hill is a question 
of minor moment ; it is at any rate an unmistakable 
and precious element of Christ's doctrine of morals. 
Note first the general thesis : ethics before religion. 
This was fundamental in our Lord's teaching, enforced 
with much emphasis and due iteration. Placability 
before sacrifice, mercy before sacrifice, filial affection 
versus Corban. Doctrine most wholesome, and ur- 
gently needed then and always. Note next the per- 
emptory terms in which the special injunction is 
enforced. The man who has a variance is supposed to 
be standing by the altar when he remembers the matter 
between him and his brother. A few minutes will suf- 
fice for presenting duly his offering. Of course, then, 
the counsel is : Despatch quickly your religious busi- 
ness and hasten back to your alienated brother, urged 
on to the work of reconciliation by the solemn feelings 
awakened by the sacrificial service. No ! but rather, 
" leave thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be 
reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy 
gift." The counsel may seem very open to criticism. 



THE MORAL IDEAL 185 

Does it not, for example, set more importance on the 
love due to a brother man, than on the honour due to 
the Father in heaven, and place the second great com- 
mandment before the first ? It may seem so, but dis- 
ciples will be more profitably occupied in laying duly to 
heart the intense ethicalism of the Master's teaching 
than in criticising His strong way of putting things. 

Next comes a precept based on the seventh command- 
ment: " Ye have heard that it was said by them of old 
time, thou shalt not commit adultery ; but I say unto 
you that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after 
her hath committed adultery with her already in his 
heart." 1 Which may be thus paraphrased: "Be not 
satisfied with abstaining from acts of impurity towards 
a woman ; regard her as a sister whose honour shall be 
for thyself inviolable, and in reference to others an object 
of jealous defence." For it is obvious that only such a 
way of regarding a woman can effectually exclude evil 
desire. Towards a sister no one but a monster could 
cherish lustful thoughts. Let every woman get a sister's 
place, and she is safe from the heart that lusteth and 
the member that offendeth. Bat what delicate, tender, 
generous love is needful for that ! Perhaps only one 
bearing our common human nature ever loved so, even 
He who spake the words I now comment on. He was 
tempted, we are taught, in all respects as we are. But 
e^ery woman He saw was as a mother, a daughter, a 
sister, — a sacred object of tender respect through the 
mighty power of a pure holy love. 

Worthy of all acceptation and honour is the doctrine 

1 Matt. v. 27, 28, 



186 WITH OPEN FACE 

Jesus taught on the kindred topic of divorce. 1 Jewish 
women had from of old been subject to grievous wrong 
in connection with the married state. They were 
regarded as the property of their husbands, and they 
were liable to be put away for any cause at the caprice 
of their lords, without redress, except that secured by 
an ancient statute which ordained that a wife when put 
away should be furnished with a document certifying 
the fact of her divorcement, so that she might be free 
from her former husband and at liberty to marry an- 
other. The scribes in our Lord's time busied them- 
selves about getting the bill of separation into due 
legal form. They did nothing to restrain the unjust 
caprice of husbands, but rather opened a wider door to 
license. Some of them recognised the most whimsical 
dislikes, even a wandering fancy for a fairer woman, 
as a sufficient reason for putting away. But they were 
duly zealous to have the bill of divorcement, even in 
such an outrageous case, in proper form, and they may 
have flattered themselves that by such action they 
were defending the rights of women. What a contrast 
between these pedants and Jesus. He raised the pre- 
vious question, and asserted a more radical right of 
woman, — the right not to be put away, except when 
she put herself away by her own misconduct. He 
revived the old heroic prophetic cry : " I hate putting 
away," 2 so performing an act of humanity of immense 
importance for Christian civilisation, and exhibiting 
courage as one fighting single-handed against long 
established evil custom. 

1 Matt. v. 31, 32. 2 Mai. ii. 15. 



THE MORAL IDEAL 187 

The Teacher on the Hill made a most valuable con- 
tribution to the illustration of the law of brotherly 
love in connection with the old legal rule of retalia- 
tion : " an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." 1 
What He said on this subject amounted to this : " Be 
not the slave of legal claims. Assert your moral 
rights by renouncing your legal ones, and refuse to 
be provoked into retaliation by any amount of injus- 
tice or unbrotherliness." The concrete forms under 
which this general precept is presented are Eastern 
in their costume, and some of them require a word of 
explanation for modern and Western readers. The 
coat and the cloak are the two principal pieces of 
man's apparel, the former being the under-garment, 
or tunic, the latter the upper-garment, or mantle, — 
the more valuable article, and serving as bed-clothing 
by night, as well as the purpose of dress by day. 
The counsel thus is : If any man claims as his legal 
right thy less valuable under-garment, dispute not 
his claim, let him have what he demands, and over 
and above thy more costly upper robe. The instance 
of compulsion to go a mile refers probably to military 
requisitions. The word rendered " compel " was orig- 
inally Persian, and was subsequently introduced into 
the Greek and Latin languages. It denoted primarily 
to requisition men, beasts, or conveyances for the cou- 
rier system, then under the successors of the Persians 
in the East, and under the Roman Empire it was ap- 
plied to the forced transport of military baggage by 
the inhabitants of a country through which troops 

1 Matt. v. 38. 



188 WITH OPEN FACE 

were marching. Doubtless the Jewish people in the 
time of our Lord had experience of this system, some- 
times in an oppressive form. An instance of compul- 
sory service under military authority is supplied in 
the Gospel narratives of the crucifixion — Simon of 
Cyrene forced by the soldiers to carry the cross of 
Jesus. 1 The counsel of Him who was one day to 
get that accidental benefit of an evil system, to dis- 
ciples gathered about Him on the hill, was this : 
" Take the sting out of the compulsion by rendering 
the service demanded freely, and make your freedom 
conspicuous by doubling the service. If required to 
carry soldiers' baggage one mile, carry it two, no man 
compelling." How wise this teaching, if hard to carry 
into practice ! Yea, and how easy too if only we had 
the requisite moral dignity and the needful amount 
of love ! What an infinite amount of annoyance men 
escape who obey these evangelic precepts, and to what 
an extent they contribute towards the humanising of 
the world. Doubtless there are men, many, who 
would victimise such gentleness, yet on a broad view 
of things it remains true that the meek shall inherit 
the earth. Christ's precepts about turning the other 
cheek, and giving the mantle into the bargain, are not 
to be turned into obligatory rules. But the spirit 
they embody is that which alone can bring about the 
desirable consummation, a universal brotherhood. 

After these examples of the Teacher's lofty ethical 
doctrine, breathing throughout the spirit of brotherly 
love, the final instance of the new way of thinking, 
1 Matt, xxvii. 32 ; Mark xv. 21 ; Luke xxiii. 26. 



THE MORAL IDEAL 189 

as opposed to the traditional, does not come upon us 
as a surprise. We are prepared to receive it simply 
as the crown of the foregoing discourse. "It hath 
been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour and hate 
thine enemy, But I say unto you, Love your ene- 
mies." 1 Luke, who omits so much, is careful to retain 
this precept, of course with the controversial refer- 
ence left out. Indeed, he not only retains it but 
gives it twice, using it in the first instance as a cap- 
tion under which to collect the moral sentences which 
in Matthew's version serve to illustrate our Lord's 
doctrine concerning the lex talionis, along with the 
law of reciprocity. 2 One cannot but feel that Luke's 
version at this point is secondary and somewhat arti- 
ficial, and that the discourse has undergone manipula- 
tion at the hands either of the Evangelist or of those 
who shaped the tradition he uses. But be that as it 
may, the author of the Third Gospel has the merit of 
perceiving that the precept " Love your enemies " was 
the most characteristic and important feature in the 
Teaching on the Hill. And the device of iteration 
to which he resorts, serves the double purpose of com- 
pensating for what is omitted, and emphasising what 
is retained. Another contrivance for the same pur- 
pose may be found in the introductory phrase : " But 
I say unto you who hear." This, coming in immedi- 
ately after the initial Beatitudes and Woes, means : 
" Now, my hearers, having spoken these opening sen- 
tences, let me declare to you what is the great funda- 

1 Matt. v. 43, 44. 

2 Luke vi. 27-34. 



190 WITH OPEN FACE 

mental duty incumbent on every disciple of mine : 
Love; love even your enemies." 

Coming back to Matthew's form, wherein we find 
both thesis and antithesis, the gist of the great law 
of love as therein proclaimed is : " Acquiesce in no 
conventional classification of men as friends and foes, 
neighbours and enemies ; let all be friends and neigh- 
bours, or let foes and strangers be distinguished as 
the objects of a more chivalrous love, so overcoming 
evil with an absolutely invincible good." This new 
teaching on its positive side would probably commend 
itself immediately and for the moment to the con- 
sciences of all hearers, but if there were any present 
who cherished friendly feelings towards the scribes, 
they might be inclined to question the accuracy and 
fairness of the representation given of their teaching. 
Had any scribe or Rabbi ever taught in so many 
words that men should love their neighbour and hate 
their enemy ? Perhaps not, especially if we under- 
stand by neighbours and enemies private or personal 
friends and foes. Yet our Lord's statement truly 
reflects the spirit which characterised the teaching of 
the Jewish schools. The tendency of Israel's election 
from the first had been to foster aversion to the out- 
side nations, and from the time of Ezra the spirit of 
Judaism had been one of growing hostility to the 
Gentiles, witness the book of Esther. And Jesus 
knew well that the average Jew was only too ready 
to follow the guidance of the scribes, and, while cher- 
ishing a tribal affection for his countrymen, to regard 
with racial and religious abhorrence all beyond the pale. 



THE MORAL IDEAL 191 

The paraphrastic clauses added to the main precept 
" Love your enemies " in Matthew's narrative, as repro- 
duced in our Authorised Version, are an importation 
from Luke. In the best texts there is only a single 
addition : Pray for those who persecute you. It ap- 
plies the general counsel to the case of those whom 
it is most difficult to love ; those viz., whose enmity 
has its origin in religion. There is no hatred so bitter 
or so hard to bear. Of such hatred the followers of 
Jesus were destined to have ample experience in later 
days, and it is very credible that with prescience of 
what was in store for them, He strove betimes to 
imbue them with the Christian temper of forbearance 
and of returning good for evil. It is possible indeed 
that all these added clauses in Luke, including the one 
in Matthew, are interpretative glosses, and that all 
that the Master said was " Love your enemies," leav- 
ing His disciples to expand the counsel for themselves. 
In that case they proved skilful commentators, for the 
love of enemies, when genuine, will just mean blessing 
them that curse you, doing good to them that hate 
you, and praying for them that despitefully use you 
and persecute you. And they were skilled interpreters 
because they were faithful doers of their Master's will. 
Their comments are simply a transcript of their con- 
duct. So they behaved, and so therefore they repre- 
sented the Master as teaching them to behave. The 
heroic temper of the Apostles, their benignant bearing 
towards foes, is a signal illustration of what even com- 
mon men can attain to through the inspiring influence 
of cherished memories of lofty teaching reinforced by 



192 WITH OPEX FACE 

an equally lofty example. " They had been with 
Jesus." 

Having laid down the new law, Jesus added character- 
istically lofty inducements to keep it : likeness to God 
(v. 45), moral distinction among men (vv. 46, 47). 
" Cultivate," said the Master, " the magnanimity of the 
Father in heaven, and rise superior to average human 
morality." Enough has been said on the former part 
of the admonition in another chapter ; l a little com- 
ment on the latter part may here be offered. Very 
noteworthy is Christ's desire that His disciples should 
be morally distinguished : " If ye salute your brethren 
only, what do ye more than others," asks He, as if the 
right and proper thing were that they should do more. 
What do ye more, or what do ye that is excellent, 
exceptionally good ! Jesus will not have His men be 
moral mediocrities, content with a virtue not beyond 
the reach of publicans and Pagans who are credited 
with readiness to love those that love them and be 
kindly affectioned towards kinsfolk. His expectations 
are great, His demands high ; on the first blush one 
might say mercilessly high. Hear what He says to 
these disciples on the hill : " Have nothing in common 
with scribes and Pharisees, their righteousness is 
naught ; do all that the average publican and Pagan 
does in the way of reciprocity, and a great deal more ; 
let neither the religious, nor the irreligious Jew, nor 
the best of Gentiles be your model. If ye will have a 
standard, let it be God. Be ye perfect, as your Father 
in heaven is perfect." Too high to be attainable do 

1 Vide chap. viii. 



THE MORAL IDEAL 193 

you say ; too high to be even taken seriously ? Nay, 
the loftiness of this moral ideal is its charm and its 
power. It is vulgar, low-pitched moral ideals that fail. 
They do not command respect, they make their appeal 
to the lower side of our nature, to self-interest and pru- 
dence ; they lack the power to awaken enthusiasm in 
any human being. The lofty unearthly ideal of Jesus 
Christ on the other hand makes its appeal distinctly, 
exclusively, and confidently to the heroic element that 
slumbers in every man. It speaks to us in words 
charged with the subtle charm of poetry, or with the 
spirit-stirring power of military music. It arouses 
enthusiasm, it transforms timid men into brave soldiers 
ready to fight without thought of fear, it makes sinful 
men partakers of the Divine nature, capable of moral- 
ity Godlike in quality, if not perfect in degree. And 
wherein lies the personal power of the Lord Jesus to 
bind human hearts to Him in devoted love and heroic 
service ? In this, that He realised His own ideal. He 
was indeed perfect as God is perfect, and in being this 
He left all His disciples, even such an one as St. Paul, 
hopelessly behind. But the Divine loftiness of His 
character does not remove Him beyond reach of our 
sympathy. We do not lose interest in Him because 
He is so much better than we are. On the contrary, 
it is by His excellence, by the rl Trepiaabv, that He 
draws us. He is to our hearts the imitable inimi- 
table, holding us at once by aspiration and by admira- 
tion. 

Among the things which Luke has retained in his 
report of the hill discourse, otherwise greatly curtailed, 



194 WITH OPEN FACE 

are the law of reciprocity, 1 the warning against judg- 
ing, 2 and the precept to forgive. 3 Doubtless they owe 
their preservation in his pages to their perceived affin- 
ity with the royal law of love. The Golden Rule finds 
its strongest expression in Matthew's version. " There- 
fore all things whatsoever ye would that men should 
do to you, do ye even so to them." 4 But even in the 
weakened form of Luke, " as ye would that men should 
do to you, do ye also to them likewise," the rule pre- 
serves its uniqueness as compared with any similar 
apothegm in the religious literature of the world. 
For the peculiarity of Christ's form of the rule is that 
it is expressed in positive not in negative terms, as in all 
other known instances. Rabbi Hillel quoted with ap- 
proval, as summing up the whole law, this sentiment 
from the book of Tobit, "Do to no one what you hate." 
Confucius, the Chinese sage, living six centuries before 
Christ, said : " Do not to others what you would not 
wish done to yourself." These and the like negative 
maxims move in the region of justice. But the posi- 
tive counsel of our Lord takes us into the wider region 
of generosity. " Whatsoever ye would that men should 
do to you " is capable of a very wide range of applica- 
tion. We may desire men to do for us ex gratia many 
things which we cannot legally demand : to stretch out 
a helping hand to us at a severe, perilous crisis in our 
lives, to speak a word for us when we are misunderstood 
and maligned, to give us food and harbour when we are 
fleeing for our lives, a Claverhouse perchance on our 

1 Luke vi. 31. 2 Luke vi. 37. 

3 Luke vi. 37. 4 Matt. vii. 12. 



THE MORAL IDEAL 195 

track. Iii short the Golden Rule as Jesus put it pre- 
scribes not merely just, but magnanimous, benignant, 
heroic behaviour towards our fellow-men after the pat- 
tern set by Himself. 

The counsel " Judge not " Luke might have been 
tempted to omit as a remnant of the antipharisaic 
polemic, for the Pharisees were prone to the vice of 
censoriousness, and there was doubtless a mental refer- 
ence to them in the admonition as originally given. 
But He knew doubtless that judging was not confined 
to Pharisees, but was apt to make its appearance even 
in Christian brotherhoods, as James also knew when he 
wrote : " Speak not evil one of another, brethren. He 
that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his 
brother, speaketh evil of the law." 1 This vice has 
played a portentous baleful part in the Church's his- 
tory, and made the religion of Jesus, as exhibited by 
many, wear the aspect of Pharisaism redivivus. Even 
within the bosom of "reformed" Churches there has 
now and then, here and there, appeared a conceited 
pietism which has been very conscious of its own 
superior goodness, and prone not only to judge others 
to be irregenerate, but even to separate themselves from 
the common herd of Christians as not worthy to asso- 
ciate with the people of God. And, alas, the members 
of the self-constituted coteries of spiritual exquisites 
are too often not by any means so holy as they pre- 
tend. The judgers are found out, and justly judged 
in turn : perceived by the healthy conscience of the 
Christian community to be pretenders who have a beam 

1 James iv. 11. 



196 WITH OPEN FACE 

in their own eye, while they busy themselves with de- 
tecting motes in the eye of a brother. This censori- 
ousness of a morbid, self-deceived piety is often a 
characteristic of crude inexperienced religious profes- 
sion, and as such it is to be borne with. But in no 
case is it to be tamely submitted to, as if those who 
practise the vice were privileged persons who must be 
allowed to say and do what they please. The preten- 
sions of such should be treated as ridiculous, as a blot 
on the Christian name, as utterly alien from the spirit 
of Christ. Judging is one of the chief offences against 
the law of brotherly love, all the more heinous that it 
is committed in the name of religion and under the 
supposed guidance of the Holy Ghost. 

"Forgive, and ye shall be forgiven," adds Luke ; or, 
as it stands in the Revised Version : " Release and ye 
shall be released." Presumably the reference is to 
moral offences, and the counsel in question is Luke's 
equivalent for the comment appended to the fifth, peti- 
tion of the Lord's Prayer in Matthew's version : " If 
ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father 
will also forgive you." 1 The principle involved is 
obviously a strong buttress to the law of brotherly 
love. And Christians concerned for their own spirit- 
ual well-being will do wisely to lay the principle to 
heart, and to take it in its broad, plain sense, without 
theological refinements. So also with kindred moral 
sentences such as : " Judge not and ye shall not be 
judged," 2 or that of St. Paul: "If we would judge 
ourselves, we should not be judged ; " 3 or that other 
1 Matt. vi. 15. 2 Matt. vii. 1. 3 1 Cor. xi. 31. 



THE MORAL IDEAL 197 

saying of our Lord : " He that humbleth himself shall 
be exalted. 1 Take all these scriptural sentiments as 
broad enunciations of great laws of the moral world, 
operating as surely as the law of gravitation in the 
physical world. If this be indeed so, how much we 
have in our power ! Judge not others, judge yourself, 
humble yourself, be ready to forgive, and your own 
pardon and salvation are sure. You are a child of 
God, a true son of the Father in heaven, a genuine 
disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. It will be well with 
you here and in all worlds, now and for evermore. 

1 Luke xviii. 14. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE CROSS IN SIGHT 

From the didactic calm of the mountain retreat to 
the mental tension and moral pathos of the northern 
wandering it is a long way. At the earlier time 
many themes engaged the attention of the Master 
and His disciples, — themes kindred, doubtless, yet dis- 
tinct : God, Man, Righteousness, Prayer. Now one 
topic fills the mind of the Master at least, if not of 
His followers : the Cross, clearly visible to Him above 
the spiritual horizon, and never henceforth out of His 
view. And the mood and mode of speech vary with 
the altered situation. Then Jesus was the Teacher 
in His school wearing a contemplative look, handling 
all subjects as matters of theory, discussing even the 
righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees in a scien- 
tific rather than in a controversial spirit. Now He 
is the Prophet with a vision of doom staring Him 
in the face, and filling His soul with solemn feeling. 
He speaks as one whose time is short to men whom 
He would prepare for a final crisis, in tones thrilling 
with emotion. 

The disciples never could forget the time and place 
when and where their Master began first to speak to 

198 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 199 

them in plain unmistakable terms concerning His 
death. The vividness of their recollection has left 
its mark on the evangelic tradition. The Evangelists 
are not uniformly careful to indicate the localities of 
the incidents they relate, but two of them distinctly 
mention whereabouts it was that Jesus first spoke 
the fateful word, " The Son of man must suffer many 
things." 1 There was no affinity between the topic and 
the town, but it was near Csesarea Philippi that the 
beloved Master began so to speak, and therefore the 
fact must be mentioned; every feature in the scene 
indelibly imprinted on the memory must be faith- 
fully reproduced. So Peter would feel when he had 
occasion to tell the pathetic story, and the realism of 
the eye-witness has been faithfully preserved in the 
pages of Mark, whence it found its way into Matthew. 
The omission of the name in the Third Gospel is one of 
several indications of the secondary character of his 
account. 2 

An announcement like that which gave a shock of 
surprise to the Twelve as they journeyed towards 
Csesarea Philippi Avas not likely to be made once 
only. If we may say so with reverence, Jesus could 
not help speaking again and again of a matter which 
lay so near His heart. Then iteration was necessary 
for the sake of the disciples. A wise Master repeats 
his lessons even when the truths communicated are 
of a theoretical nature ; how much more will he 
deem repetition needful when the subject of instruc- 
tion is a fact which must vitally affect conduct. A 
1 Matt. xvi. 13 ; Mark viii. 27. 2 Luke ix. 18. 



200 WITH OPEN FACE 

crisis is at hand which for good or for evil will form 
the turning point in the lives of these men ; how 
necessary to impress the fact upon them in good 
tinie by all possible means, even if it were by monot- 
onous re-statement over and over and over again. 
Jesus did not hesitate to have recourse to this device, 
and that circumstance also impressed itself indelibly 
on the minds of Peter and his companions, as the 
Evangelic Records show. Three several predictions 
of the Passion are reported by the Evangelists, even 
by Luke, who usually avoids repetition of incidents. 1 
Monotony is relieved by new features introduced into 
each successive announcement, as the picture became 
clearer to the Prophet's eye, or with prudent regard 
to what the disciples could bear. First the general 
announcement is made that the Son of man must go 
to Jerusalem to suffer many things at the hands of 
the rulers of Israel and be killed ; next the ominous 
hint is given that He is to be betrayed into the 
hands of His murderers ; then finally some harrow- 
ing details are added as to the " many things " to be 
endured, with an accompanying intimation that the 
Gentile authorities are to have a hand in the tragedy. 
But more than announcement was necessary ; in- 
struction, to help men to whom the harsh intolerable 
fact was bluntly stated to comprehend, and in some 
measure to accept, the awful situation. It may be 
taken for granted that Jesus did everything that was 

1 The first in Matt. xvi. 21, Mark viii. 31, Luke ix. 21 ; the second 
in Matt. xvii. 22, 23, Mark ix. 30-32, Luke ix. 43-45; the third in 
Matt. xx. 17-19, Mark x. 32-34, Luke xviii. 31-34. 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 201 

possible for this purpose, not contenting Himself with 
stating on His prophetic authority, So it shall be, 
but endeavouring to make it clear by all available 
lines of thought why it so must be; thus adding 
teaching to prophesying. From the Evangelic Records 
we gather that teaching and prophesying were com- 
bined from the first. Jesus, they report, "began to 
teach them that the Son of man must suffer." 1 This 
" must " (Set) covers much more than the fact : its 
inevitableness, as the unavoidable natural effect of 
causes that were actually at work, its correspondence 
to what Old Testament history and prophecy might 
lead one to expect, its congruity with the laws of 
the spiritual world, or its fitness as an event taking 
its place in the moral order of the universe under 
the Providence of God. That all these points of view 
were present to Christ's own mind we cannot doubt. 
Whether He would discuss them all with His dis- 
ciples would depend on His estimate of their capacity 
to understand. The probability is that while some 
of His thoughts He made no attempt to communi- 
cate, there were others bearing on each aspect of the 
"must" which He deemed it expedient to utter. On 
the leaven of the scribes against which He had warned 
His disciples at the starting of the memorable journey, 
He might expatiate with hope of being understood, 
referring to past experiences in illustration of its ma- 
lignant character. To the copious references in the 
Old Testament to sufferings endured by the righteous, 
He might allude with reasonable expectation that they 

1 Mark viii. 30. 



202 WITH OPEN FACE 

would enable the disciples to perceive that tribulation 
overtaking one who had not deserved ill at men's hands 
was after all no strange unheard-of thing. On these 
aspects of the subject, therefore, it may be assumed 
that He spoke, though the records contain very scanty 
indications of the fact. The ethical rationale of the 
Passion, the bearing of the " must " on the moral order 
of the world, is much the most abstruse phase of the 
problem, and it would not have surprised us if the 
Gospel had not contained a single saying of Jesus 
bearing on that recondite topic. And yet on the other 
hand, if we find in their pages words touching thereon, 
reported as spoken by Jesus to His disciples in those 
last days, we do not receive their report incredulously ; 
for, as already said, the presumption is that the Master 
would do all in His power to make His followers com- 
prehend the situation on all its sides. 

Two sayings bearing on the rationale of the Passion 
are reported as having been uttered by Jesus, one in 
connection with the first announcement of its approach, 
the other in connection with the sons-of-Zebedee in- 
cident which followed closely on the third. On the 
former occasion, Jesus, according to the accounts of 
Matthew and Mark, having in view the opposition of 
Peter, said to all present, including the Twelve: "Who- 
soever will come after me let him deny himself and 
take up his cross, and follow me.'* In the circum- 
stances the word meant that His predicted suffering, 
so far from being an improbable or absurd suggestion, 
the bare mention of which was an outrage on right 
feeling, was simply the exemplification of a universal 



THE CKOSS IN SIGHT 203 

law applicable to all who were minded as He was to 
devote themselves with singleness of heart to the 
Divine interest. Thus interpreted, the saying was 
not fitted to make the coming fate of the Master 
greatly more bearable to disciples as a matter of ex- 
perience, for there is not much comfort in the thought : 
I must suffer, and you, if loyal, must all suffer along 
with me. But it did tend in some measure to make 
the Master's sufferings more intelligible as a matter 
of theory. It is always a satisfaction to the intellect 
when a fact is taken out of a position of isolation 
and brought under the sway of a general principle. 
That the disciples fully comprehended the scope of 
the reflection is not likely, but they would not fail 
to be struck with it, and it is not at all surprising 
that they remembered it long after. There is not 
the least ground for doubting the authenticity of the 
saying. The reference to the cross is no reason for 
suspicion, for the mode of punishment it represented 
would be familiar to all Jews then living, and it might 
be referred to by Jesus, even without prescience of 
the manner in which He Himself was to suffer death, 
simply as the emblem of a cruel and humiliating ex- 
perience. It makes for the historicity of the saying 
that the idea it embodies is ethical, not theological. 
One can understand people living in the apostolic age, 
and especially such as were familiar with Pauline doc- 
trine, imputing to the Lord Jesus words expressive of 
the theological significance of His death, as a unique 
event demanding an explanation peculiar to itself. 
Such was the way in which the apostle Paul viewed 



204 WITH OPEN FACE 

the matter. But such is not the view embodied in 
the saying in question. The event to be explained 
is not regarded as isolated, and the theory under which 
it and the whole class of events to which it belongs is 
brought, moves in the region of ethics, not of theology. 
In effect the doctrine taught is that all the godly must 
suffer persecution. That doctrine the apostolic Church 
understood, but it was not in terms of it that believers 
were wont to express their thought concerning the 
meaning of Christ's death. The saying now under 
consideration, therefore, was not an importation into 
the Gospels, but a genuine reminiscence of the first 
lesson taught by the Lord concerning the significance 
of His Passion. 

It is a very important lesson which must form the 
broad ethical foundation of all theological superstruct- 
ures that aspire to abiding validity. There may be 
some respects in which the death of Christ is singular, 
but there are also respects in which it belongs to a class 
of facts in the moral world. These common aspects 
cannot be overlooked without vitiating effect on theo- 
logical theory. To the category belongs, suffering for 
righteousness" sake. That Jesus so suffered is certain, 
and that in this He has had mairy companions is not 
less so. To see the likeness, however, it is necessary 
to keep before our minds the most salient instances. 
With reference to many disciples of the great Master 
it seems an exaggeration to say that their lot is to bear 
a cross, in any sense worthy of the name. You must 
.think of the exceptionally faithful men, the moral 
heroes of history, the prophets, apostles, martyrs, and 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 205 

confessors, to be fully convinced of the sober truth of 
the doctrine taught at Csesarea Philippi. If you take 
it as applying to all who at any distance follow Christ, 
then you must either view it as an over-statement, or 
you must conceive the cross, not as the emblem of great 
critical tribulations, but rather as the symbol of the 
petty troubles that constantly befall those who try, 
however imperfectly, to live a good life. 

The latter alternative was adopted by Luke. The 
introduction into the saying of the word " daily " 1 
makes all the difference. Luke's version of the first 
lesson is manifestly secondary in this respect, and 
indeed in all respects. His omission of the opposition 
and consequent rebuke of Peter removes the link con- 
necting the cross of the Master with the cross of the 
disciple as belonging to the same moral category. In 
representing the word of the cross as spoken to all, he 
suggests the experience of the many, rather than that 
of the few as the sphere of its verification. In repre- 
senting cross-bearing as a daily business, he withdraws 
our attention from those rare and capital instances of 
suffering on account of righteousness which justify the 
term " cross," and broadly exemplify the truth of the 
law. In keeping with this treatment of Christ's mem- 
orable word to His disciples is his manner of dealing 
with the whole incident of which it forms a part. His 
narrative, up to the point at which He introduces it, 
does not prepare us for so solemn a declaration. We 
see no reason why Jesus should just then begin to speak 
about His Passion. Luke's omissions, e.g., of the en- 

1 Luke ix. 23. 



206 WITH OPEN FACE 

counter with the Pharisees in respect to ceremonial 
ablutions, and of their demand for a sign, hide from 
readers the causes that were steadily working towards 
a tragic issue. Therefore the intimation that such an 
issue was inevitable comes upon us as a surprise almost 
as much as it came upon the disciples. In Luke's 
conception of the Bel the view of our Lord's death as 
the effect of causes that were in operation all through 
His public career had little or no place. He seems to 
have thought chiefly, if not exclusively, of the necessity 
that Old Testament prophecy should be fulfilled. 

More remarkable, because expressing a less familiar 
thought, is the second contribution Jesus made towards 
a theory of the Passion: " The Son of man came not to 
be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His 
life a ransom for many." 1 It sets the approaching 
event in a new and brighter light, as not merely a 
disaster overtaking Jesus because His public conduct, 
however loyal to God, has aroused deadly hostility 
among the religious leaders of Israel, but as a source 
of benefit to many men. Jesus here conceives His 
death, not as a fate, but as a service, the supreme illus- 
tration of the truth that the Son of man came not to 
be served but to serve. From the connection in which 
the thought is introduced, indeed, it is clear that the 
Speaker expects ultimate benefit to Himself from this 
extraordinary service. It is the way he takes to the 
place of sovereign. By lowly service He expects to 
become the greatest. But it is a roundabout way. 
The many will serve Him because they are conscious 
1 Matt. xx. 28 ; Mark x. 45. 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 207 

He has made them His debtors by His ministering 
life and death. 

There is no reason to donbt the genuineness of this 
great word. It fits the situation, and admirably crowns 
the discourse of Jesus to His disciples concerning the 
true way to greatness. Its originality and grandeur 
guarantee its authenticity. Then it was to be expected 
that Jesus would, both for His own comfort and for 
the consolation of His disciples, do His utmost to invest 
the harsh fact of His death with " poetic, mystic, spirit- 
ual meanings," to put a bright optimistic face on a 
dark pessimistic outlook. This had been His way all 
along ; His doctrine of the Divine Fatherhood was a 
signal example of His will and power to introduce sun- 
shine into the darkest experiences of life. It may be 
taken for granted that the happy habit of mind which 
asserted itself so triumphantly in the admonition 
against care in the Hill Teaching, would not desert 
Him when His own hour of trial came. He would 
know how to transmute a supreme evil into a supreme 
good, and to deck His cross with flowers. We see 
Him engaged in this very work at this time when He 
gives to His approaching sufferings the poetic names 
of a cup and a baptism. Why should He not also call 
it a ransom? That word doubtless has to our ear a 
theological rather than a poetic sound, and may suggest 
the doubt: have we not in this term and in the whole 
saying in which it occurs, a theologoumenon of the apos- 
tolic age put into the mouth of Jesus ? The absence 
of the saying from Luke's pages, in which the whole 
Sons-of-Zebedee incident has no place, might be cited 



208 WITH OPEN FACE 

in justification of the doubt. It is such a use of the 
third Evangelist's omissions that induces me to take 
pains to point out what I conceive to be the true 
characteristics of His presentation of the evangelic 
story. I maintain that when these are properly under- 
stood this particular omission ceases to have any value 
as an argument against the historicity of the Ransom 
Logion. And to make this as clear as possible I here 
remark that Luke's Gospel is, by comparison with the 
other two Synoptists, very deficient in material bearing 
on the significance of Christ's death. The first lesson 
on the subject already considered is so altered by him 
that we hardly recognise it as a lesson. The second 
contained in the Ransom Logion is wholly omitted. 
The third lesson also, that taught in connection with 
Mary's vase of ointment, by the suggestion that her act 
in anointing Jesus and His act in dying were to be for- 
ever associated together as of kindred nature x — this 
too is wanting in the Third Gospel, the whole story 
being passed over. The only thing that remains is 
the fourth lesson contained in the words spoken by 
Jesus at the institution of the Supper: "This cup is 
the New Testament in my blood tvhich is shed for you."'' 
In the judgment of experts in New Testament criticism, 
it is very doubtful whether even these words had any 
place in the true text of Luke. In their edition of the 
Greek Testament, Westcott and Hort enclose within 
double brackets all that folloAvs " This is my body " in 
Luke xxii. 19, with the whole of the following verse, 
ending with the words above quoted. Other well- 
1 Matt. xxvi. 13 ; Mark xiv. 9. 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 209 

known scholars agree with them in thinking that Codex 
Bezae, which omits the passage, here preserves the 
original text, and that the words left out in that Codex 
were introduced by another hand from St. Paul's ac- 
count of the institution of the Supper in his first epistle 
to the Corinthians. Into this critical question I cannot 
here enter, nor have I any desire to pronounce a con- 
fident opinion upon it. I simply remark that the 
omission of the Ransom Logion, and of the saying con- 
cerning Mary of Bethany, makes the omission of the 
bracketed clauses in Luke's report of the institution of 
the Supper less improbable than it might otherwise 
appear. Supposing they were omitted, what would be 
the result ? This rather startling one, that Luke's 
Gospel would not contain a single word of Jesus that 
could be regarded as a contribution towards explaining 
the moral or theological significance of His death. The 
Acts, a companion work to the Third Gospel, contains 
little or no theology of the cross. Hence, on the hypoth- 
esis in question, the state of the case as regards Luke 
would be this: that throughout his writings there is no 
trace of St. Paul's theory of atonement, though there is 
abundant evidence of warm sympathy with the Apostle's 
Christian universalism. 1 This is a phenomenon which 
calls for more consideration than it has yet received. 

Thus far of the prejudice against the historicity of 
this saying arising from its omission by Luke. It re- 
mains to offer a few remarks on a similar prejudice 

1 The words "which He purchased with His blood," in St. Paul's 
speech to the Elders of Ephesus (Acts xx. 28), contains the nearest 
approach to a definite theological theory. 



21" WITH OPEN FACE 

created by its apparently theological character. Is it 
credible, one may ask. that so definite and developed a 
theological theory as to the significance of our Lord's 
death could come from the lips of the Lord Himself ? 
By way of reply the previous question might reasonably 
be raised : Have we here developed theology, or even 
theoloo'v at all ? Is the word " ransom " necessarilv 
used in a technical theological sense exclusively appli- 
cable to the death of Christ ? May it not be employed 
in a general ethical sense applicable to all whose lives 
are sacrificed in a sfood cause with more or less benefi- 
cent effect ? In a recently published commentary I 
find this comment on the passage : " All that is re- 
quired by the statement, not in the way of minimizing 
it. but to fill out its meaning is. that his life becomes 
the price by which men are freed from their bondage. 
The soldiers in the American civil war gave their 
lives as a Xvrpov for the slaves, and every martyr's 
death is a Xvrpov. There may be more than this involved 
in the death of the Redeemer, but more than this is 
not involved in His words here." 1 This, to men 
accustomed to the developed theories of dogmatic- 
theology, may seem a very meagre interpretation, but it 
is a perfectly legitimate one. and the idea it finds in the 
text is true as far as it goes, and apposite to the connec- 
tion of thought. And when the historicity of the say- 
ing is in question, we are neither bound nor entitled to 
charge its terms with a plethora of theological mean- 

1 The Gospel according to St. JIark by Rev. Ezra P. Gould. S.T.D.. 
in the International Critical Commentary published by Messrs. T. & 
T. Clark. Edinburgh, and Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons. New York. 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 211 

ing ; we may and must understand them as used in a 
natural, spontaneous, non-technical, fluid sense, as ex- 
pressing a great broad truth relating to the moral order 
of the world. Such a truth would be this : that the 
moral and spiritual progress of the world is never sig- 
nally advanced without sacrifice, and that those whose 
lot it is to make the needful sacrifice may in an intelli- 
gible sense be said to lay down their lives a ransom for 
many. The question may of course be raised: What is 
the ultimate reason of this unquestionable fact ? Why 
is it that moral progress on the great scale is so costly, 
and by what categories of thought can the cost be best 
estimated and understood ? This is a problem for theo- 
logians and philosophers. The saying ascribed to our 
Lord sets the problem, but there is nothing to show 
that He meant His words to be a contribution towards 
its solution. 

From the faithful narratives of the Evangelists, it 
appears that the words of the Master, taken even in 
their broadest and most obvious sense, made little im- 
pression at the time on the minds of His disciples. 
The}^ soon recovered from the depression caused by 
sombre anticipations, and with the buoyancy of children 
rebounded to congenial light-mindedness. That a crisis 
was coming they believed, but they hoped it would be 
very different from that pointed at by their Master's 
gloomy forebodings. While He spake of a cross they 
dreamt of crowns, and vain thoughts awoke ambitious 
passions which ended in unseemly wranglings. Hence 
Jesus had two tasks to perform in those last months : 
to expound under its varied aspects the doctrine of 



212 WITH OPEX FACE 

sacrifice, and to discipline the unruly tempers of His 
followers. 

Of the efforts made bv our Lord in this second direc- 
tion the Gospels give some interesting accounts. The 
memorable words to which the saving last considered 
belongs, wherein the great law, distinction to be at- 
tained by service, was enunciated, is a precious sample 
of the sublime schooling to which the Master subjected 
His scholars. Thanks to James and John and their 
mother for creating, through their foolish aspiration, a 
fitting opportunity for the utterance of such never-to-be- 
forgotten thoughts. 

This was not the first lesson of the kind the disciples 
had received. They had been to school already in 
Capernaum just after their return from the excursion 
to CaBsarea Philippi. For on the way home they had 
been disputing on the question: Who is the greatest? 
and their Master had felt that no time must be lost in 
dealing with the new spirit of ambition that had ap- 
peared among them. Mark's account reproduces the 
scene very vividly before us. Jesus, he tells us, " sat 
down and called the Twelve," 1 both actions betokening 
a resolute purpose to school the disciples in humility. 
The Master takes His seat, the teacher's posture, calls 
His scholars with a magisterial tone, calls them as the 
Twelve, destined to an important vocation and need- 
ing thorough discipline to be of service in it. Every- 
thing points to a great effort lasting probably for a 
considerable time, hours, during which Jesus doubtless 
gave expression to many weighty thoughts, all serving 

1 Mark ix. 35. 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 213 

the same general purpose, such thoughts as we find re- 
ported with greatest fulness in Matthew's Gospel. 1 
It is conceivable that the first Evangelist in this part 
of his narrative follows his usual method of grouping 
words of kindred import irrespective of their historical 
connection. But there is nothing in the chapter which 
might not have been spoken on the occasion indicated 
in the opening verse. Full as Matthew's report is, 
even he has not given all. Luke contributes nothing 
peculiar to him, his account being very meagre. Mark, 
however, has preserved a very remarkable saying, not 
found in Matthew's record, which commends itself at 
once as an integral part of the Capernaum admoni- 
tion. It is the Logion concerning Salting. 2 Part of 
it : " Salt is good, but if the salt have lost his saltness, 
wherewith will ye season it ? " is found in other connec- 
tions in Matthew and Luke (in Matthew v. 13 and in 
Luke xiv. 34, 35), but the remainder is peculiar to 
the Second Gospel. The passage has its difficulties, 
critical and exegetical, but the general sense is plain. 
The drift is : " Salting in some form is inevitable, in 
the form of self-discipline it is indispensable. Every 
man must be salted somehow, either with the un- 
quenchable fire of gehenna or with the fire of severe 
self-sacrifice. Wise is he who chooses the latter alter- 
native. Without salting in the sense of self -discipline 
no one can perform the function of being a salt to the 
world. The morally undisciplined, subject to ambi- 
tious desires, are a salt without a savour, useless, 
worthless." This was a seasonable thing to say to 
1 Matt, xviii. 2 Mark ix. 49-50. 



214 WITH OPEN FACE 

men whose vocation was to be Apostles of the Christian 
religion. It pointed to a character thoroughly purged 
from selfish passions as an indispensable condition of 
future usefulness in the exercise of apostolic functions. 
And there Avas another word needed for the present 
condition of the disciple-circle distracted by internal 
jealousies, its harmony disturbed by the dispute about 
places of distinction. They could not afford to be at 
war among themselves, a small band facing a hostile 
world. Peace was indispensable. How was it to be 
restored and maintained ? The prescription is again, 
salting. " Have salt in yourselves and be at peace one 
with another." In the first place the disciples are 
thought of as themselves salt for the world, but now 
they are viewed as the subjects of the salting process. 
They are summoned to see to it that their own inward 
man be duly salted, in order that they may be able to 
live at peace among themselves and avoid further un- 
seemly wrangling. And as it was ambition that led 
to a breach of the peace, so the salting will consist in 
getting rid of that evil spirit at all hazards, even though 
it should mean excision of an offending member. This 
salting is not to be confounded with the cross-bearing 
of faithful disciples of which Jesus had spoken on a 
previous occasion. Cross-bearing is the tribulation 
that comes on all who follow closely in the footsteps 
of Christ. Salting is the discipline of self-denial nec- 
essary to make a man a follower of Christ worthy of 
the name. 

When we think of all the stern words spoken by our 
Lord at this time to His chosen companions, we are as 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 215 

profoundly impressed with the intense moral earnest- 
ness of the Master as we were with the wisdom of the 
Teacher, while studying the doctrine taught on the 
mountain-top. The Teaching on the Hill opened with 
a series of sentences setting forth the kind of men who 
are the true citizens of the Kingdom and partakers of 
its blessedness. Taken in the abstract, the Beatitudes 
present a beautiful object of mental contemplation, a 
poetic ideal whose charm is unfading. But one might 
expect even the Divine Artist who drew the fair pict- 
ure to be content with something short of the ideal in 
practice, especially in the case of His own followers. 
Yet He was not. He meant it seriously, and expected 
all who were about Him to take it not less seriously. 
To His own friends He said : " Unless ye change, and 
from ambitious men striving for prominence become as 
the children, ye shall not even enter the Kingdom, not 
to speak of being great there. 1 If any man, even if it 
be one of you, in his pride and selfish pursuit of his 
own advancement, despise or trample under foot a 
' little one ' his appropriate doom will be to be thrown 
with a heavj" millstone round his neck into the deepest 
part of the sea. 2 If ye be not placable, ready to forgive 
from the heart a brother who has offended, my heavenly 
Father will treat you as the King in the parable treats 
the unmerciful servant." 3 How uncompromising! 
What a passion for moral purity ! How profound the 
conviction in the mind of the Lord Jesus, that without 
a disciplined spirit thoroughly schooled into the virtue 
of the Kingdom these men can be of no use, and that a 
1 Matt, xviii. 3. 2 Matt, xviii. 6. 3 Matt, xviii. 35. 



216 WITH OPEN FACE 

society of such men can only be a corrupt, worthless 
community, on which the eye of the Divine Father can- 
not rest with satisfaction. Alas ! organised Christian- 
ity has at all times borne too close a resemblance to the 
disciple-circle at this period. Church History gives 
tragic emphasis to the counsel, " Have salt in your- 
selves, and have peace one with another." Scandals, 
offences, quarrels, divisions innumerable, all for lack of 
salt. But let us turn from the humbling story, and fix 
our eyes on a more edifying subject of contemplation. 
Let the weakness of disciples serve as a foil to the 
moral strength of their Master. The inner history of 
the Jesus-circle in those weeks is disenchanting enough. 
There is a traitor in the camp, who, having laid the 
Master's foreboding of danger more to heart than the 
rest, meditates escape from an ill-fated brotherhood by 
playing false to its Head. Three have been favoured 
by being chosen for special companionship with the 
Master during a season of retirement, and either they 
grow vain, or their brother disciples become jealous. 
Two try to snatch the first places for themselves, and 
the ten are indignant. While the Master inculcates 
kindness to the little ones, His scholars have to confess 
an act of arrogance and intolerance committed against 
one who had given no just cause of offence. 1 How 
Jesus towers in moral grandeur above these little men 
whom He condescends to make companions ! Incapable 
of disloyalty, He marches straight towards His doom. 
The glories of the hill of Transfiguration do not dazzle 
His eyes. " Tell no man of the vision." Primacy, 
1 Mark ix. 38 ; Luke ix. 49. 



THE CROSS IN SIGHT 217 

greatness, is not His watch-word, but Service even 
unto death. Monopoly receives no countenance from 
Him : " Forbid him not ! " Here is the moral sublime 
not merely touched for a moment, but consistently 
sustained. Christians ! bow in lowly reverence before 
that transcendent character, and remember that ye are 
worthy of your name in proportion as the mind, the 
ethical spirit of Jesus, dwells in you. That spirit is 
the true salt which promotes peace, and conditions 
power. The moral tone of a Church is the measure of 
its Christianity and of its spiritual influence. 



CHAPTER XII 

GETHSEMANE 

The experience of our Lord in the Garden was a 
rehearsal of the Passion. In that hour of agony He 
realised in thought and feeling all that He was about 
to suffer. Privacy is the privilege of such as pass 
through deep waters of soul-trouble, and reverence 
raises a monitory finger, protesting against intrusion. 
But Jesus took three with Him into the sacred en- 
closure, and through them all the world has been 
made acquainted with the solemn scene. The sufferer 
did not desire to screen Himself from observation. 
He would have His followers see Him in His weak- 
ness as well as in His strength. He was not ashamed 
of His human infirmity, nor guided by a false pride 
whispering : " Let no mortal man see me with a 
troubled countenance." He counselled and practised 
secrecy when publicity would give to conduct the 
aspect of a theatrical performance meant to win ap- 
plause, but not when it was more likely to bring 
reproach than praise. Hide your good deeds, He 
said to His disciples. Hide tears : on no account 
allow the woman in you to appear, He did not 
say. Nor did He act on this stoical maxim. " Jesus 

218 



GETHSEMANE 219 

wept " at the grave of Lazarus. He let it be known 
that His soul was "exceeding sorrowful even unto 
death." Sentimentality, effeminacy, had no place in 
His nature, but womanliness had. There was a soft 
tender woman in Him, as well as a brave heroic 
man, and He was content that all that was in Him 
should be known. In this unreserved self-manifesta- 
tion lies the truth and charm of His character. He 
has nothing to hide, He can afford to be seen through 
and through ; the exposure of that which men are 
tempted to hide only heightens our admiration and 
our love. Therefore we may not hesitate to consider 
what is recorded of our beloved Lord's experience in 
Gethsemane. It is part of the picture presented to 
our view in the mirror of the Gospels, and it com- 
pletes the portraiture. We have seen Jesus in His 
zeal as an evangelist, in His benevolence as a Healer, 
in His wisdom as a Teacher, in His faithfulness as a 
Master, in His courage as the foe and critic of a false 
but pretentious and tyrannical pietism ; it is well that 
we see Him finally when His strength seems to have 
gone from Him and He is become like any other man. 
It will help us to realise that our Saviour was indeed 
" in all points tempted like as we are — yet without 
sin." 

Another view of the matter is of course possible. 
The infirmity of Christ's humanity is wholly free from 
sin in reality and for such as can understand it. But 
apparently? and for such as have not the necessary 
spiritual insight to appreciate its true character ? Is 
there not a risk of such an experience as that in the 



220 WITH OPEN FACE 

Garden being misunderstood ? Were it not good, 
therefore, to throw a veil over it by total omission 
or qualified report? Let the agony be a holy mys- 
tery known, if at all, only to the initiated. Peter, 
James, and John may be there, but let them keep 
what they see and hear to themselves. 

Some such feeling seems to have prevailed in cer- 
tain parts of the primitive Church. Indications are 
not wanting that Luke's account of the incident took 
its shape under the influence of a prudent reserve. 
These will be pointed out in due course. Meantime, 
our attention must be given to the narratives of 
Matthew and Mark which betray the influence of 
the other view, viz., that there was something tend- 
ing to edification to be learned from a frank recital 
of what befell Jesus during the hour preceding His 
apprehension. The general features of the story are 
the same in both ; Mark's version is, on the whole, 
the most realistic. 

The essential features of the incident, as reported 
in the first two Gospels, are these : 1 From the supper 
chamber, in Jerusalem, Jesus goes forth towards the 
Mount of Olives, accompanied by His disciples. On 
the way, the shadow of the cross begins to fall on 
His spirit, and He begins to speak to the disciples 
of the panic which is about to overtake them. They 
arrive at an enclosed property called Gethsemane ; 
probably because it contained an oil press. He bids 
the outer circle of eight sit down there and wait 
His return, then enters the garden, taking with Him 
1 Matt. xxvi. 36-45 : Mark xiv. 32-41. 



GETHSEMANE 221 

the inner circle of three — Peter, James, and John — 
bidding them halt at a certain point, and asking them 
not merely to wait, but to watch : " with me," Matthew 
adds, suggesting a desire on their Master's part for 
their sympathy to sustain Him through the crisis. 
While giving them this direction, He makes a full 
confession of His mental distress : " My soul is ex- 
ceeding sorrowful even unto death." The access of 
this soul-sorrow is indicated in these terms : " He 
began to be sorrowful and very heavy-hearted." He 
began. Jesus had long known, and had often with 
realistic plainness spoken of, what was to befall Him. 
Yet the vivid sense of what it all meant came upon 
Him at this time as an appalling revelation. The 
beginning referred to by the Evangelists probably 
points to the moment at which distress became vis- 
ible. The inward beginning came earlier, but was 
concealed till the following had been reduced to three, 
when Jesus allowed his inward state to appear to those 
who, He hoped, might be able to bear the revela- 
tion and give Him a little sympathy. Mark's descrip- 
tion of the on-coming of the eclipse is very strong. 
He uses three descriptive words for Matthew's two, 
one being peculiar to him. Jesus is represented as 
not only sorrowful and heavy-hearted, but amazed. 

Jesus then advances further into the garden, falls 
all His length on the ground, and begins to pray. 
Both Evangelists give the words spoken, with slight 
variations, Mark prefixing an indication of its gist, 
viz., that "if it were possible the hour might pass 
from Him." There are three successive acts of 



00 



WITH OPEN FACE 



prayer, all having the same burden : if it be possible 
let the cup pass. Between the acts Jesus conies back 
to the three disciples, hoping to find them sympathet- 
ically watchful. Instead He finds them asleep the 
first time, and again the second time, in spite of His 
reproachful word, and earnest admonition to watch 
and pray for themselves, lest the}' be overtaken by 
sudden temptation. Returning the third time He 
bids them sleep on now and rest, adding according 
to Mark : ; *It is enough." He knew, for He immedi- 
ately went on to state, that the moment for His ap- 
prehension was at hand, so giving to the permission 
to sleep an ironical meaning. And yet it was not 
mere irony. It meant, " You may sleep on now with- 
out interruption so far as I am concerned. I no 
longer need your sympathetic watchfulness, I have 
conquered in the struggle, I am prepared to meet 
the hour and drink the cup." 

The struggle had been very real while it lasted. 
All signs point to an even tremendous conflict : the 
craving for sympathy, the confession of mental dis- 
tress, the prostrate attitude, the thrice repeated 
prayer, the pressing importunate, "if it be possible." 
Yet what room for struggle in a mind already 
made up ? How can the suppliant conceive, as even 
abstractly possible, escape from a doom which months 
ago He clearly perceived and openly declared to be 
inevitable ? It must be, Bel, He had said again and 
again to His disciples. And had He not taken pains 
to explain to them the grounds of the " must," en- 
larging now on the malice of the scribes, anon on 



GETHSEMANE 228 

the predictions of ancient Psalmists and Prophets, at 
another time on the facts and laws of the moral 
world ? Has the wise Teacher forgot His own in- 
structions ? No, but it is one thing to teach, another 
to apply the lesson to your own case when the dark 
hour of trial comes. The "must" proclaimed at 
Csesarea Philippi, and often reiterated, might be 
rooted in the wicked purpose of the scribes, in an- 
cient prophecy, and in the moral order of the 
universe, but it was contrary to the order of human 
nature, which rose in rebellion against that triple 
necessity. Scribes, Prophets, great moral laws might 
cry " must " and the intellect and the conscience ac- 
knowledge the truth of their cry, but the flesh and 
the sensitive human soul recalcitrate, and in His dis- 
traction the sufferer can but exclaim : If it be pos- 
sible ! And this is not the first time He has felt 'the 
painful internal conflict, though it is the first time 
He has allowed it to appear. That stern word to 
Peter, " Get thee behind me, Satan," shows that the 
struggle was on Him even at Caesarea Philippi. The 
disciple's "this shall not be unto thee " had voiced the 
instinctive recoil of His own heart. The agony in the 
Garden is but the final conflict with a weakness of 
which the Faithful One has been conscious all along. 

No wonder the conflict was keen. The cup Jesus 
had to drink was full of bitter ingredients. Death, 
death in youth, death by injustice, death by violence, 
death in a form horrible to think of, death brought 
about by conspiracy between a false disciple and un- 
principled priests, death as a victim of human sin under 



224 WITH OPEN FACE 

all its varied aspects, death in utter loneliness, deserted 
by all his chosen companions. But God, His Father, 
was He not with Him, and was His presence not enough 
to sweeten the cup, or at least to mitigate greatly its 
bitterness ? Yes, the Father was with Him, and He 
realised the fact all through the hour of trial. From 
first to last the filial consciousness was in the ascendant. 
The key-note of filial trust was struck in the first act of 
prayer, in its opening phrase : " O my Father." His 
Father's heart is His place of refuge in this hour of 
dire distress ; His Father's love and His Father's wis- 
dom and power, and the boundless possibilities at His 
command for extricating those who trust in Him and 
serve Him from the most desperate situations. No 
way of escape had appeared open to His own view, all 
things had seemed to unite in saying, It must be ; but : 
"all things are possible unto thee, O Father." Jesus 
addresses His Father not as the Appointer of the cup, 
but rather as the only Being in all the world who is 
able to take it away. And yet with His habitual view 
of Divine Providence, He could not conceive of His 
Father's relation to the cup as merely permissive. He 
knew that unless the Father had put the cup into His 
hand it would not have been there. " The cup which 
my Father hath given me shall I not drink it ? " 1 
Thus the doctrine of the Divine Fatherhood which He 
had taught His disciples becomes to Himself now a two- 

1 John xviii. 11. The words quoted are all that remain of the 
Gethsemane experience in the Fourth Gospel. They indicate the tri- 
umphant result of an unrecorded struggle, and imply knowledge of 
the struggle on the part of the Evangelist. 



GETHSEMANE 225 

edged sword, a source at once of perplexity and of 
consolation. This bitter cup, my Father hath put it 
into my hand, and that adds to its bitterness. Not 
merely men, friends and foes, are against me, but my, 
God, my Father seems to forsake me. Yet in the mere 
fact that my Father wills it, I find sweet comfort, for 
all He does is well. Here is an antinomy solved by 
faith, not insoluble even for thought. Piety always 
contrives to solve such antinomies, but the reflective 
thought of those who are confronted with them is not 
always able to suggest adequate theoretical solutions. 
The prophets of Israel were in this position. They 
believed that God was righteous, and in their experience 
He appeared to them most unrighteous. They held on 
to faith in the Divine righteousness, but they could not 
explain the conflicting phenomena of Providence ; these 
remained for them an inscrutable mystery. Was it so 
with our Lord Jesus ? No ; by thought as well as by 
faith He surmounted the antinomy. He understood 
that it was a law and not an accident that the righteous 
suffer in this world. He understood moreover that it 
was a beneficent law : that the sufferings of the right- 
eous issued in good even to the unrighteous ; that the 
death of the just is a ransom for the souls of the unjust. 
Doubtless He understood also, though this does not ap- 
pear from the Gospel records, that the sufferer Himself 
gains from His hard experience. " Perfected by suffer- 
ing " is the formula offered by the author of the Epistle 
to the Hebrews to justify the thesis : "It became Him 
for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, 
to subject the Captain of Salvation to a painful and 



226 WITH OPEN FACE 

humbling experience. " 1 It is a true, beautiful, and help- 
ful thought which has not received from systematic 
theology so full a recognition as it deserves. It means 
that by His curriculum of temptation and suffering 
Jesus was perfected for the office and function of 
Captain of Salvation, because thereby He was subjected 
to an experience which called into play the virtues 
of faith, patience, obedience, and sympathy, qualif} T ing 
Him to be a merciful High Priest worthy of, and win- 
ning, the unhesitating trust of sinful men. 

The victory of our Lord in Gethsemane consisted 
not merely in submission to the will of His Father, but 
in the intelligent acceptance of that will as good, wise, 
well-grounded. That was what He had achieved by 
the three-fold act of prayer. That three distinct de- 
votional acts were necessary is no ground of reproach. 
Complete mastery in thought and feeling in such crises 
of temptation comes to no man without prolonged 
effort. It is the result of a process with distinguish- 
able stages. It is not to be supposed that in the three 
acts, words and mood were absolutely identical. We 
might infer that they were from the statements of the 
Evangelists, especially from that of Mark, but the in- 
ference would be hasty. Neither they nor the three 
disciples, who were the ultimate source of information, 
were able to tell precisely all that happened. Peter, 
James, and John heard a few words in which the name 
" Father " was most distinct, and they gathered that 
the burden of all their Master said was, " Help me to 
say, Thy will be done." Each act doubtless had its 

1 Heb. ii. 10. 



GETHSEMANE 227 

distinctive character, by each in succession a step in 
advance was taken. In the first, nature found relief 
by unreserved utterance " with strong crying and 
tears" of all it had to say against the " cup." When 
this wave of emotion had dashed itself against the 
shore, there would come a moment of calm during 
which the sufferer would naturally go back to the 
three, seeking a little comfort in the presence of loved 
ones. Then another wave began to raise its head ; 
the mood of wrestling and the need of solitude re- 
turned. Again prostration and lifting up of the soul 
to God ; but this time not in mere passionate out- 
pouring of nature's revolt. Rather an endeavour to 
collect thought and summon into consciousness all that 
helped to see that the cup must be drank, and that 
however bitter it was wholesome. Of this change in 
tone there is a perceptible trace in the words which 
Matthew makes our Lord utter in His second prayer : 
" O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from 
me, except I drink it, thy will be done." It was first : 
" Oh that the cup might pass ! " but now it is : " I per- 
ceive it cannot, though it be bitter." Again an inter- 
lude of calm after clear insight attained and a second 
visit to the three. And the final stage ? It is : " Thy 
will be done, I will drink the cup. I see it must be, 
and I see that it is well. I resist no more." 

The thrice repeated prayer in Gethsemane, thus 
viewed, is manifestly not chargeable with that bat- 
tology against which Jesus had warned His disciples. 
It is not a case of vain repetition in hope to be heard 
through much speaking. It is the case of an earnest 



228 WITH OPEN FACE 

soul wrestling with itself in the presence of God, 
whose good-will is never doubted, and making steady 
progress in self-conquest ; first exhausting passion by 
expression, then bringing reason into play, and finally, 
with all that is within, saying : Amen, God's good will 
be done. In his fine exposition of the Gethsemane 
incident, Calvin rebuts the charge of battology by the 
remark that : " Christ teaches us by His example that 
we ought not to be discouraged or become weary of 
praying when we do not at once obtain our desires." 
The moral is good, but not apposite. When Jesus 
taught His disciples by parables to persevere in prayer, 
He meant them to persist in asking the same thing, 
surely believed to be a thing God was willing to grant, 
e.g., the Holy Spirit, aye and until they at length ob- 
tained it, though it should not be till after the lapse of 
years. But in the prayers of Gethsemane Jesus did 
not repeat Himself. He began with one thing and 
ended with another. What He sought at first was 
deliverance from death ; what He at length obtained 
was deliverance from the fear of death. The lesson to 
be learned, therefore, is rather to bring our trouble into 
the presence of God, and to remain there till the dark 
cloud lifts and the sunshine returns. 

Thus far of the solemn scene in the garden as it is 
described in the pages of Matthew and Mark. Let us 
turn now to the narrative in Luke. From it, as it 
stands in the Authorised Version, comes the traditional 
name for this sore trial of our Lord, the " agony," but 
if we omit the part of the narrative in which that word 
occurs (verses 43, 44) what remains gives us no 



GETHSEMANE 229 

adequate conception of an experience to which such a 
term could be fitly applied. 

Leaving out these verses, the report contained in the 
Third Gospel is as follows: 

Chap. xxii. v. 39 " And He came out, and went, as 

He was wont, to the Mount of 
Olives, and the disciples also fol- 
lowed Him. 
v. 40 " And when He was at the place 
He said unto them: Pray that ye 
enter not into temptation. 
v. 41 " And He withdrew from them 
about a stone's cast, and kneeling 
He prayed, 
v. 42 " Saying, Father ! if thou be will- 
ing, remove this cup from me, 
nevertheless, not my will but 
thine be done." 
v. 45 " And when He rose up from His 
prayer and came to His disciples 
He found them sleeping for sor- 
row. 
v. 46 " And He said to them: Why sleep 
ye, rise and pray, that ye enter 
not into temptation." 
The differences between this account and the com- 
panion narratives are obvious, and their combined 
effect is to present a very subdued view of the occur- 
rence. Among the more important variations are 
these : First, the introduction of the expression " as He 
was wont," the effect of which is to deprive this par- 



230 WITH OPEN FACE 

ticular visit to the garden of special significance. Had 
we only Luke's report, it would not occur to us that 
anything very remarkable was going to happen. Next, 
in so far as any particular interest attaches to the occa- 
sion, it seems to centre in the disciples rather than in 
their Master. In the other two Gospels Jesus says : 
Sit ye here while I go and pray yonder. Here He bids 
the disciples pray with the view of warding off tempta- 
tion, as if the need for prayer were on their side only. 
Then the Master retires about a stone's cast, not merely 
from the greater number but from them all; for here 
there is no mention of Jesus taking the three along 
with Him into the interior recesses of the garden. 
They were taken to be sympathetic company, but as 
Christ's need of sympathy has not been indicated, that 
feature in Luke's narrative naturally falls away. With 
it disappears also the unreserved confession of mental 
distress made to the three. There is nothing in Luke 
corresponding to the " My soul is exceeding sorrowful 
even unto death " of Matthew and Mark. In harmony 
with this omission is the manner in which the praying 
of Jesus is dealt with. It is not passed over, but it is 
slightly touched on. The Master's wrestling in prayer 
is not the outstanding fact; He simply prays as well 
as His disciples. The gesture is kneeling, not as in 
Matthew and Mark, self-prostration on the ground. 
And there is only a single act of prayer. Having 
calmly uttered the petition, " Father, if thou be willing, 
remove this cup from me; nevertheless not my will but 
thine be done," Jesus rises from His prayer and returns 
to His disciples whom He finds sleeping "for sorrow." 



GETHSEMANE 231 

And what He says to them is in keeping with the 
whole preceding representation of the event, as con- 
stituting a crisis for the disciples, rather than for their 
Master. Not a word of complaint because they had 
failed to watch; only a gentle reminder that it was not 
a time for sleeping, but for praying against the access 
of temptation. 

These features of Luke's account all hang together, 
presenting a perfectly coherent story, and making a 
quite definite impression, viz., that the Gethsemane 
experience was indeed a crisis, but a crisis for the 
Twelve rather than for Jesus. Turning now to the 
two omitted verses, what shall we say of them ? That 
they are out of keeping with their context, and intrude 
themselves into an incongruous narrative like a vein 
of igneous rock piercing through a stratified formation. 
They are, as is well known to critics, of very doubtful 
genuineness, tested by documentary evidence, being 
omitted by some most important manuscripts of the 
Greek Testament, and by many ancient versions. The 
external evidence against them is admittedly strong, 
but stronger still in my judgment is the internal evi- 
dence arising from the manifest incongruity between 
the picture they suggest and that presented in the 
rest of the narrative. Here we have an agony, or 
desperate struggle, a mortal weakness, demanding and 
receiving supernatural aid, a bloody sweat falling in 
great drops from the forehead to the ground ; there 
no signs of distress, weakness, fear, or exhausting com- 
bat, but throughout calmness, composure, self-mastery. 
The question, observe, is not as to the historic truth of 



232 WITH OPEN FACE 

the added particulars. They may form a genuine ele- 
ment of the evangelic tradition as to what befell our 
Lord in Gethsemane. The point insisted on is that 
the sentences containing these details have no proper 
place in Luke's account. They did not come from his 
hand, they do not harmonise with the general spirit 
and tendency of his Gospel as a whole and of this par- 
ticular part of his narrative. They have been added 
by another hand with a view to supplement, I might 
even say to correct, his account. The note of correc- 
tion may be detected in the expression " He prayed 
more earnestly." It betrays a feeling that the praying 
of Jesus as previously described lacks intensity. The 
feeling was well founded. There is no trace of inten- 
sity in the reported behaviour of Jesus up to this point ; 
all witnesses rather to calm self-control. But from 
Luke's point of view that was not a defect ; therefore, 
it is not from him that the notice of an altered tone 
emanates, but from one who knew that the experience 
in the garden was a much more serious matter than 
it appeared in the original narrative. The foreign 
origin of the correction is betrayed by its coming in 
too late. The intensity should have come in at the 
beginning. It is altogether improbable that the prayer 
of Jesus was languid and half-hearted at first, and that 
He grew earnest as He went on. That is the way 
often with us, but it would be far otherwise with our 
Lord at that tremendous hour ; first, an unrestrained 
outburst of passionate resistance, then, and then only, 
tranquil submission attained through resolute struggle. 
On these grounds I regard it as certain that verses 



GETHSEMANE 233 

43, 44 formed no part of the Third Gospel as it came 
from Luke's hand. And I do not think it serves any 
good purpose to disguise the fact by retaining it as 
part of the text against the best critical judgment, as 
has been done in the Revised Version. It simply 
tends to prevent readers from observing the peculiar 
characteristics of Luke's account as compared with the 
versions of Matthew and Mark. To make these promi- 
nent, doubtless, may in some measure conflict with the 
aims of those whose supreme concern is to harmonise 
the Evangelists. But the pressing interest of our time 
is historicity, not harmony. That the sense of histori- 
city may be strengthened by the critical ascertainment 
of what may be called the personal equation of each 
Evangelist, I have already endeavoured to show. 1 The 
general statement then made is not without application 
to the case before us. Luke's account of the " agony " 
in the garden, in which there is no trace of agony, 
shows that in certain circles within the church of the 
apostolic or subapostolic age a tone of feeling pre- 
vailed to which it would have appeared unfit that 
Jesus should be represented as afraid to die, or as 
passionately recoiling from the awful ordeal through 
which He was about to pass. Where this feeling was 
so strong that to disregard it might involve the risk of 
shaking faith in the Saviour's devotion to His redeem- 
ing work, the task of a historian concerned equally 
for truth and for edification became a delicate one. 
The resultant of the two forces counterworking each 
other could hardly fail to be either a subdued report of 
1 Vide chap, iii., towards the close. 



234 WITH OPEN FACE 

the experience in the garden, such as we have in the 
authentic narrative of Luke, or a bare statement of the 
triumphant result of an unrecorded struggle, such as 
we have in John, in the words " The cup which my 
Father hath given me, shall I not drink it ? " And 
a gain to the interest of historicity does distinctly 
accrue from carefully noting these two ways of treat- 
ing an event in our Lord's earthly life in deference to 
local exigencies of edification. We learn thereby 
where to look for the full objective historic fact, even 
to the narratives of Evangelists exempt from the press- 
ure under which the companion accounts were com- 
piled. If you want to know what really befell our 
Lord in the garden, read, first, Mark and Matthew ; 
then read Luke, clearly understanding that you have 
to do with a subdued account; then finally take up 
John, and learn from him the resolute mind with 
which Jesus issued from Gethsemane. 

That the narratives of the Third and Fourth Gospels 
took shape under a religious influence of the kind de- 
scribed, is a hypothesis suggested to explain certain 
characteristics observable in them. It must be taken 
for what it is worth. Assuming its truth, I do not call 
in question the legitimacy of the methods by which Evan- 
gelists sought to meet local and temporary religious 
needs. I only remark that it was well for the perma- 
nent universal needs of the Church that four Gospels 
and not merely two have been preserved. For we 
should have lost much if the weakness of Christ, as He 
passed through the valley of the shadow of death, had 
remained unknown ; if He had appeared in the evan- 



GETHSEMANE 235 

gelic tradition as one who prayed only once concerning 
the " cup," or as one who did not need to pray at all. 
Preternatural divine superiority to fear and to suffer- 
ing is sublime and imposing, but a Jesus acquainted 
with a very real fear, and soul-distress even unto death, 
is very human, and a veritable Brother. A weak 
human Christ has religious value as well as a strong 
Divine Christ. That we see, but not we only. There 
were those even in the first Christian asfe who under- 
stood it well. Witness the author of the Epistle to 
the Hebrews. How strongly he asserts the infirmity 
of Jesus in connection with the scene in Gethsemane, 
representing Him as offering up prayers and supplica- 
tions with strong crying and tears unto Him that was 
able to save Him from death. 1 The interest in which 
He does this is that he may thereby prove how far 
Jesus was from being a usurper of the priestly office. 
Instead of taking this honour to Himself, He was rather 
in that Gethsemane experience, as viewed by the writer, 
saying in effect, Nolo pontifex fieri, saying it not pro 
formd, in mock humility, but with tremendous earnest- 
ness and unmistakable sincerity. It is a fine thought, 
one of many in the Epistle evincing a strong grasp of 
the fact and the moral glory of Christ's earthly humil- 
iation. That grasp the writer did not share with his 
readers. They saw in the humiliation of Jesus, viewed 
as the Christ and the Son of God, simply a stumbling- 
block to their faith, whence arose an imperious neces- 
sity for one who wished to aid them to do his best to 
set that aspect of our Lord's earthly life in its true 

1 Heb. v- 7. 



236 WITH OPEN FACE 

light. From the Gospel of Luke and the Epistle to 
the Hebrews taken together it may be inferred that 
inability to understand the religious significance of the 
humiliation prevailed extensively in the early Church. 
One may wonder why the two writers adopted such 
different methods of dealing with the situation ; the 
Evangelist succumbing to it, so to speak, the author of 
the Epistle manfully grappling with it in hope of com- 
municating to his readers a new view of the whole mat- 
ter. The explanation may in part be that the former 
possessed a less degree of insight than the latter. But 
it must also be remembered that the tasks of the two 
writers determined the paths they must respectively 
take. Luke was writing a history, the unknown author 
of Hebrews was writing an epistle. Luke could only 
relate, the author of Hebrews had a free hand, and could 
argue and explain. He could state the fact strongly, 
because the more strongly it was put the better it 
proved his thesis. Where the fact could not be ex- 
plained, or connected with a theory, and yet was thought 
to stand very much in need of explanation, the alterna- 
tive left was to state it weakly or omit it altogether. 

The writer of Hebrews not onlv states the fact of 
Christ's struggle strongly, but points its moral clearly. 
He saw in that tragic experience a Son learning obedi- 
ence to the will of His Father which appointed that 
through suffering He should become the Author of 
eternal salvation. Let us bow in lowly reverence be- 
fore Him who so loyally learnt the hard lesson ! And 
may God give us grace to obey Him as He obeyed His 
Father, that we may be of the grand army which the 
great Captain leads to Glory! Amen. 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 

" Suffer the children to come unto me," said Jesus. 
It is with a view to fulfil this command that I write 
this concluding chapter. It is my desire that the 
children also may see Jesus " with open face." Exist- 
ing Catechisms do not accomplish this good object. 
In them Jesus is seen only through the somewhat 
opaque veil of theology. I do not quarrel with theo- 
logy, but it should come last, not first. Theology is 
for full-grown men, not for children. The Jesus of 
the Gospels is for all. There is indeed much in the 
Gospels also that is beyond the comprehension of early 
years. But they contain much suited to young capaci- 
ties, quite enough to enable children to know Jesus 
well, and to love Him with all their hearts. 

To gather out of the Gospels this Gospel for the 
children is my present aim. If I include in my Primer 
some things young people cannot fully understand, I 
trust there will be found nothing in it to which they 
can attach no meaning. I arrange the material in 
Catechetical form. 

1. Who was Jesus? 

He was the Son of Mary of Nazareth in Galilee 
whose husband Joseph was a carpenter. 

237 



238 WITH OPEN FACE 

2. What is the meaning of the name Jesus ? 

It means "Saviour," for the mission of Jesus was 
to save men from their sins. 

3. What happened to Jesus when he was twelve 

years old ? 
He went up to Jerusalem to the passover with 
His parents, found His way into the temple 
where the doctors taught, and was there when 
His parents left to go home. 

4. What did He say to His mother when she found 

Him? 
" How is it that ye sought me ? Wist ye not that 
I must be in my Father's house ? " Luke ii. 49. 

5. What was the early occupation of Jesus ? 

When He grew up to manhood He became a car- 
penter. 

6. Why did He leave this occupation ? 

Because the Spirit of God told Him He must now 
enter upon His higher work as a religious teacher. 

7. How did He enter upon His higher work ? 

He left Nazareth and went southwards towards 
the mouth of the Jordan, to be baptized by a 
prophet named John. 

8. What happened to Jesus after His baptism ? 

He saw the heavens cleft and the Spirit of God as 
a dove descending upon Him. He also heard a 
voice out of heaven saying : " Thou art my 
beloved Son, in thee I am well pleased." 

9. Where did Jesus go after His baptism ? 

He returned to Galilee to begin teaching, and thus 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 239 

a "people which sat in darkness saw a great 
Light." Matthew iv. 16. 

10. Where did Jesus preach ? 

In the synagogues in which pious Jews met to 
worship God on the Sabbath days. 

11. Did Jesus preach often there ? 

Yes. " He went into their synagogues throughout 
all Galilee preaching." Mark i. 39. 

12. What was His text in the synagogue of Nazareth f 
It was taken from Isaiah lxi. and these were the 

words : — " The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, 
because he anointed me to preach good tidings 
to the poor. He hath sent me to proclaim 
release to the captives, and recovering of sight 
to the blind; to set at liberty them that are 
bruised. To proclaim the acceptable year of 
the Lord." Luke iv. 18, 19. 

13. What impression did His discourse make on the 

hearers ? 
They all marvelled, for the words He spoke then, 
as in all the synagogues, were " words of grace." 
Luke iv. 22. 

14. Did Jesus preach only in the synagogues ? 

No, He preached in the synagogues at the begin- 
ning, but afterwards in the streets, or the high- 
ways, or in any place where men gathered to 
hear him. 

15. Did many come to hear Him ? 

Yes, very many, for the common people loved 
to hear Him, and He not only preached to them 
but healed their sick. 



240 WITH OPEN FACE 

16. Did He heal many ? 

Yes, very many, and of all manner of diseases. 
In Capernanm one Sabbath evening, at sunset, 
they brought unto Him all that were sick and 
He healed them all. Mark i. 32, 33. 

17. How was He able to do this ? 

"The power of the Lord was with Him to heal." 
Luke v. 17. 

18. What ancient oracle was fulfilled by this healing 

ministry ? 
" Himself took our infirmities and bare our dis- 
eases." Matthew viii. 17. 

19. Who were the publicans ? 

They were the men who collected the taxes for 
the Roman government. They were much dis- 
liked, because they were often unjust, and be- 
cause they were the servants of a foreign power 
from which the Jews longed to be free. 

20. Did Jesus dislike the publicans ? 

No, He pitied them, preached to them also, and 
even ate with them, and with people whom good 
folks called "the Sinners." 

21. Did other religious teachers treat publicans and 

sinners so ? 
No, they shrank from them with abhorrence. 

22. Why did Jesus differ so from other teachers and 

religious people ? 
Because He had a marvellously loving heart. 

23. What did the religious people of Capernaum say 

when they saw Jesus meeting and eating with 
the publicans and sinners ? 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 241 

They asked " How is it that He eateth and drink - 
eth with publicans and sinners ? " Mark ii. 16. 

24. What answer did Jesus give to their question ? 
He said : " They that are whole have no need of 

the physician, but they that are sick ; I came 
not to call the righteous but sinners." Mark 
ii. 17. 

25. What else did He say in His defence ? 

At another time He said : " To whom little is for- 
given the same loveth little." Luke vii. 47. 

26. What did He mean by this ? 

He meant that a great sinner, like the woman who 
came into Simon's house to anoint His feet with 
precious oil, when pardoned, loves the Saviour 
much, and that one, who like Simon, thinks 
himself a little sinner, loves the Saviour little. 

27. Did He make any other defence for being kind to 

the sinful ? 
Yes, He once said by means of parables, What joy 
there is in finding things lost ! 

28. What is a parable ? 

It is a story of common life made up to teach a 
truth of the spiritual life. 

29. What parables did Jesus make to teach the joy of 

finding things lost ? 
He made three parables : one about a lost sheep, 
another about a lost coin, a third about a lost 
son. 

30. What is the parable of the Lost Sheep ? 

" A certain man had a hundred sheep, and having 
lost one of them left the ninety and nine in the 



242 WITH OPEN FACE 

wilderness, and went after the lost one till he 
found it. And when he found it he laid it on 
his shoulders with joy. And when he came 
home he told his neighbours, and they were all 
pleased that he had found the lost sheep." 
Luke xv. 3-7. 

31. What is the parable of the Lost Coin? 

" A very poor woman had ten small pieces of silver 
money, and lost one of them. She lit a lamp, 
swept the house, and sought till she found it. 
In her joy she told her neighbours and they all 
rejoiced with her." Luke xv. 8-10. 

32. What is the parable of the Lost Son? 

It is a much longer story, too long to tell. But it 
was about a son who got money from his father 
and went away and wasted it in a distant land, 
and so became poor as a beggar, and in his 
misery thought he had better go back to his 
father's house. He did, and his father, who had 
missed him much, saw him coming, and ran to 
meet him, and wept with joy when he had him 
in his arms, and said, " Quick ! bring forth the 
best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on 
his hand and shoes on his feet, and bring the 
fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and be 
merry, for this my son was dead and is alive 
again, he was lost and is found." Luke xv. 
11-24. 

33. Had Jesus any companions as He went about 

preaching and healing ? 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 243 

Yes, He was attended by men whom He called 
disciples. 

34. What is a disciple ? 

He is a person who joins himself to a great teacher 
to get instruction from him. 

35. How many disciples had Jesus ? 

A goodly number followed Him, both men and 
women, but there were twelve men whom He 
regarded as disciples more than others. 

36. Whom did Jesus first call to be disciples ? 

He first called four men who lived by fishing in 
the sea of Galilee : Peter and Andrew, brothers ; 
James and John, also brothers. 

37. What did Jesus say to them when He called them ? 
He said : " Come ye after me and I will make you 

fishers of men." Matthew iv. 19, Mark i. 17. 

38. Was Jesus very desirous to have disciples ? 

Yes, He longed to have about Him men who loved 
wisdom more than anything else, and who could 
understand and value His teaching. 

39. By what words did He show this desire ? 

He said : " Come unto me, all ye that labour and 
are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take 
my yoke upon you and learn of me ; for I am 
meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest 
unto your souls. For my yoke is easy and my 
burden is light." Matthew xi. 28-30. 

40. Who are those that " labour and are heavy laden ? " 
Jesus was very willing to have as disciples those 

who earned their bread with the sweat of their 
brows, but He meant chiefly those who had earn- 



244 WITH OPEN FACE 

estly sought the knowledge of God and of sal- 
vation, and had not found it. 

41. When did Jesus instruct His disciples ? 

Chiefly in seasons of retirement when He escaped 
from the crowds who constantly followed Him. 

42. Can you name one of the places to which Jesus 

retired with His disciples ? 
The top of the hills on the west side of the sea of 
Galilee. 

43. What were the subjects of the teaching Jesus gave 

to His disciples on the hill-top ? 
They were God, the Kingdom of God, and the 
Righteousness of God. 

44. What did Jesus say concerning God ? 

He called God " Father " : " your Father who is 
in heaven." 

45. What did Jesus mean by that name ? 

He never exactly explained what He meant. 

46. How then did the disciples know what Jesus meant ? 
They guessed His meaning from what they knew 

of their own fathers. 

47. Are earthly fathers in all respects like the Father 

who is in heaven ? 
No, they sometimes give evil gifts, or refuse good 
gifts, to their children, but the Father in heaven, 
Jesus told his disciples, always gives good gifts 
to them that ask Him. 

48. What surer means had the disciples of knowing 

the spirit of the Father in heaven ? 
They knew by the way in which Jesus used the 
name. 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 245 

49. Can you give an example ? 

Jesus said : " Let your light so shine before men 
that they may see your good works, and glorify 
your Father who is in heaven." Matthew v. 16. 

50. What might disciples learn from this ? 

That God as their Father was delighted when 
they, His sons, behaved in a brave, noble, heroic 
manner, and were not afraid to speak the truth 
and do the right, even when it was dangerous. 

51. Can you give another example ? 

In the Teaching on the Hill Jesus said concerning 
the Father in heaven that " He maketh His sun 
to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth 
rain on the just and on the unjust." Matthew 
v. 45. 

52. What might disciples learn from this? 

That their Father in heaven was great-minded, 
doing kind deeds even to His unworthy chil- 
dren, and that He desired His sons to be like 
Him in this. 

53. In what terms did Jesus teach His disciples to 

be like their Father in this respect? 
He said: "Love your enemies and pray for them 
that persecute you." Matthew v. 44. 

54. Can you give yet another example ? 

In the Teaching on the Hill Jesus said : " Behold 
the birds of the air : they sow not neither do 
they reap, nor gather into barns, and your 
heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not of 
more value than they?" Matthew vi. 2G. 

55. What might disciples learn from this? 



246 WITH OPEN FACE 

That God our Father careth for every living 
creature, but more especially for human beings, 
who are of more value in His eyes than birds, 
or beasts like sheep and oxen, and most of all 
for men and women who make it their chief 
business in this world to do good. 

56. What did Jesus say concerning the Kingdom of God? 
He explained its nature by telling who were its 

citizens. 

57. In what sayings did Jesus describe the citizens of 

the Kingdom? 
In the sayings called the Beatitudes, which all 
begin with the word " Blessed." 

58. What are these sayings? 

In the Teaching on the Hill Jesus spake these 
words : 

" Blessed are the poor in spirit ; for theirs is 

the kingdom of heaven. 
Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall 

be comforted. 
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit 

the earth. 
Blessed are they that hunger and thirst 

after righteousness, for they shall be 

rilled. 
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall 

obtain mercy. 
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they 

shall see God. 
Blessed are the peace makers, for they 

shall be called the sons of God. 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 247 

Blessed are they that have been persecuted 
for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the 
kingdom of heaven." Matthew v. 3-10. 

59. How would Jesus have us regard the Kingdom of 

God? 
As the highest good, to be desired above food 
and raiment and all earthly good. 

60. In what words did He teach this ? 

" Seek ye first the Kingdom and the Righteous- 
ness of your Father, and all these things shall 
be added unto you." Matthew vi. 33. 

61. To what precious things did Jesus liken the 

Kingdom of God? 
In two parables He likened it to a treasure hid in 
a held, and to a costly pearl. 

62. What is the parable of the Treasure hid in a Field? 
" The kingdom of heaven is like unto a treasure 

hid in the field, which a man found and hid 
again, and in his joy he goeth and selleth all 
that he hath and buyeth that field." Matthew 
xiii. 44. 

63. What is the parable of the Costly Pearl? 

" The kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant 
man seeking goodly pearls, who when he had 
found one pearl of great price went and sold 
all that he had and bought it." Matthew xiii. 46. 

64. What did Jesus teach concerning righteousness? 
What Jesus taught concerning righteousness may 

be summed up in these two precepts : Be unto 
God all that a son should be to a Father ; 
treat fellow-men as brethren. 



248 WITH OPEX FACE 

65. In what words did Jesus express these two 
precepts ? 
" Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy 
heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy 
mind. This is the first and great command- 
ment. And the second is like unto it, thou 
shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Matthew 
xxii. 37-39. 

6Q. In what other words did Jesus express the 
second of these commandments? 
" All things whatsoever ye would that men should 
do to you, do ye even so to them." Matthew 
vii. 12. 

67. What did He add to these words ? 

" This is the Law and the Prophets." 

68. What did He mean thereby? 

He meant that the Hebrew Scriptures, called the 
Old Testament, teach in effect the same thing. 

69. How can we show our love to God ? 

By doing His will, by trusting Him, and by ask- 
ing of Him such things as we need. 

70. Where do you learn God's will? 
In the Ten Commandments. 

71. What are the Ten Commandments? 
They are these : 

1 Thou shalt have no other Gods before me. 

2 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven 

image. 

3 Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord 

thy God in vain. 

4 Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 249 

5 Honour thy father and thy mother. 

6 Thou shalt not kill. 

7 Thou shalt not commit adultery. 

8 Thou shalt not steal. 

9 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy 

neighbour. 
10 Thou shalt not covet anything that is thy 
neighbour's. 

72. What did Jesus say concerning the third com- 

mandment ? 
He said : " Swear not at all, but let your speech be 
yea, yea; nay, nay." Matthew v. 34, 37. 

73. What did Jesus say concerning the fourth com- 

mandment ? 
He said : " The Sabbath was made for man, and 
not man made for the Sabbath." Mark ii. 27. 

74. What did He mean by this ? 

He meant that God made the Sabbath for man's 
benefit, and that the day must be so kept 
that God's end shall be reached. 

75. What else did He teach concerning the Sabbath? 
He taught that acts of kindness and things which 

are necessary may be done on the day of holy rest. 

76. With what words did He teach that acts of kind- 

ness may be done on the Sabbath? 
He said : " It is lawful to do good on the Sabbath 
day." Matthew xii. 12. 

77. What doctrine was taught in the Jewish schools 

concerning the fifth commandment? 
They said : Make gifts to the temple even if your 
father and mother should starve. 



250 WITH OPEN FACE 

78. What did Jesus teach? 

He taught that we must honour, and if needful 
aid, our parents first. Matthew xv. 4-6, 
Mark vii. 10-12. 

79. What did Jesus say concerning the sixth com- 

mandment ? 
He said : Far from killing thy brother, thou must 
not even be angry with him, or call him fool. 
Matthew v. 21, 22. 

80. What did Jesus say concerning the seventh com- 

mandment? 
He forbade evil desire as well as evil acts. 

81. What did Jesus say concerning the eighth com- 

mandment ? 
He taught that far from taking from another 
that which is his, we should be willing to let 
another take from us wrongfully that which 
is ours. Matthew v. 40. 

82. How did Jesus teach trust in God as our Father? 
He spake to His disciples these words : " Take no 

thought for your life what ye shall eat, or what 
ye shall drink, nor yet for your body what ye 
shall put on. Is not the life more than the 
meat, and the body than the clothing. Be- 
hold the birds of the air ! they sow not neither 
do they reap, nor gather into barns, and your 
heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not of 
much more value than they? And which of 
you by taking thought can add one cubit unto 
his stature? And why take ye thought for 
raiment? Consider the lilies of the field how 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 251 

they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin. 
Yet I say unto you that even Solomon in all 
his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 
But if God so clothe the grass of the field 
which to-day is and to-morrow is cast into the 
oven, shall He not much more clothe you, O ye 
of little faith?" Matthew vi. 25-31. 

83. How would Jesus have us pray ? 

In secret rather than before men, in simple words, 
and believing that God our Father is ever ready 
to grant what we ask if it be good for us to 
receive it. 

84. How did He teach secrecy in prayer ? 

He said : " When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, 
and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy 
Father which is in secret." Matthew vi. 6. 

85. How did He teach simplicity in prayer ? 

He gave His disciples an example, commonly 
called "the Lord's Prayer." 

86. What is the Lord's Prayer ? 
The Lord's Prayer is as follows: 

"Our Father who art in heaven! Hallowed be 

thy name. 
Thy Kingdom come. 

Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. 
Give us this day our daily bread. 
And forgive us our debts as we forgive our 

debtors. 
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver 

us from evil." 

Matthew vi. 9-13. 



252 with open face 

87. How did Jesus teach trust in Prayer ? 
He said: 

" Ask and it shall be sfiven you, 

Seek and ye shall find. 

Knock and it shall be opened unto you. 

For every one that asketh reeeiveth. and he 
that seeketh findeth. and to Mm that knock- 
eth it shall be opened. 

Or what man is there of you. who. if his son 
shall ask him for a loaf, will give him a 
stone; or if he shall ask for a fish, will give 
him a serpent ? 

If ye then, being evil, know how to give good 
Lfifts unto your children, how much more 
shall your Father who is in heaven give 
good things to them that ask Him! K 

Matthew vii. 7-12. 

88. Who were the scribes ? 

They were men who studied the law of 
Moses, explained it. and added to it many 
rules. 

89. Who were the Pharisees ? 

They were religious people who very strictly kept 
all the rules of the scribes. 

90. Did any of the scribes, or of the Pharisees, be- 

come disciples of Jesus ? 
One scribe offered to follow Jesus, but He did 
not wish to have him for a disciple. 

91. What did Jesus say to him ? 

" The foxes have holes and the birds of the air 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 253 

have lodging-places, but the Son of man hath 
not where to lay His head." 

Matthew viii. 20. 

92. Whom did Jesus mean by the Son of man ? 
He meant Himself. 

93. Why did He call Himself by that name ? 
Because He was humble and humane; He pre- 
ferred the title " Son of man " to the title 
" Son of David," and He very much loved men. 

94. Why did He not wish to have the scribe for a 

disciple ? 
Because He feared that in heart he was like the 
other scribes. 

95. What was the character of the scribes ? 

They were proud, and they were hard-hearted. 
They wished to have an anointed one, a Christ, 
who should be a great King of whom they could 
boast, and they laid heavy legal burdens on 
men's shoulders. 

96. Why did the scribes and Pharisees dislike Jesus ? 
Because He would not be a Christ such as they 

desired, and because He removed the burdens 
they laid on men's shoulders. 

97. What names did they call Jesus ? 

They once called Him a " blasphemer '' because 
He told a palsied man that his sins were for- 
given. Matthew ix. 3. 

98. What other names did they call Jesus ? 

They called Him a drunkard, and a glutton. 
Matthew xi. 19. 

99. Why did they give Jesus these evil names ? 



254 WITH OPEN FACE 

Because He was kind to the poor publicans and 
sinners. 

100. What did Jesus say when they spoke evil of Him? 
He said : " Whosoever shall speak a word against 

the Son of man it shall be forgiven him." 
Matthew xii. 31. 

101. Did the meekness of Jesus soften the scribes and 

Pharisees ? 
No, they continued to dislike Him more and more, 
till at length they wanted to kill Him. 

102. Did Jesus know of their wicked purpose ? 

Yes, He knew, and He told His disciples that ere 
long they would put Him to death. 

103. What did Jesus do when He saw what His enemies 

were aiming at ? 
He went out of their way that they might not kill 

Him before the due time. 
101. Where did He go ? 

To and beyond the northern boundary of Galilee. 

105. How was He occupied there ? 

In preparing His disciples for the end. 

106. How did He do this ? 

By telling them plainly that He was to suffer 
death, and by striving to make them resigned 
to what was coming. 

107. What means did He use for this purpose ? 

He told them that all who serve God faithfully in 
this world must suffer, that His sufferings 
would be for the good of the world, and that 
after His death He would rise again. 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 255 

108. In what words did Jesus teach that the faithful 

must suffer ? 
" If any man would come after me let him deny 
himself, and take up his cross, and follow me." 
Matthew xvi. 24. 

109. In what words did Jesus teach that His sufferings 

would be for the good of the world ? 
" The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, 
but to minister, and to give His life a ransom 
for many." Matthew xx. 28, Mark x. 45. 

110. Were the disciples ready to receive this teaching ? 
No, they were slow of heart to understand it. 

Ill Did they believe that disaster was about to over- 
take their Master ? 
No, they expected rather that He would soon be 
placed on a glorious throne as the anointed, or 
" Messianic," Son of David, promised by the 
prophets of Israel, and expected by the Jews. 

112. What did they expect for themselves ? 

They expected that they would all, as the com- 
panions of Jesus, be great, and they disputed 
among themselves who should be greatest. 

113. How did Jesus feel when He saw this? 

He was grieved by their vain thoughts and 
sought to correct these. 

114. What did He do for this purpose ? 

He took a child into His arms and said : " Unless 
ye be like this child ye cannot be great in the 
kingdom of heaven, ye cannot even enter it at 
all." Matthew xviii. 2-4; Mark ix. 36, 37. 

115. Did Jesus love children ? 



256 WITH OPEN FACE 

Yes. Once when mothers brought their children 
to be blessed by Him, and the disciples tried to 
keep them away, He said: "Suffer the little 
children to come unto me ; forbid them not, for 
of such is the kingdom of God." Mark x. 14. 

116. What happened to Jesus in Bethany a few days 

before His death? 
A woman, by name Mary, poured a vase of precious 
ointment on His head while He sat at table. 

117. What did Jesus say concerning this action? 
"Wheresoever this Gospel shall be preached in 

the whole world, there shall also this that this 
woman hath done be spoken of for a memorial 
of her." Matthew xxvi. 13, Mark xiv. 9. 

118. Why did He say this ? 

Because Mary's act, though blamed as waste by 
the disciples, was noble, and because her act in 
breaking the alabaster vase and shedding its 
contents, was like His own in yielding Himself 
to be crucified. Both were acts of generous 
love. 

119. What solemn transaction took place on the night 

before Jesus was crucified ? 
Jesus took bread, blessed it, brake it, gave it to 
His disciples, and said : " Take, eat, this is my 
body." Then he took a cup of wine, blessed 
it also, and gave it to the disciples, saying: 
"This is my blood shed for many." Mark 
xiv. 22-25. 

120. What did this action signify ? 

It signified that the death of Jesus was at last at 



THE CHRISTIAN PRIMER 257 

hand, and that it was not to be deplored, be- 
cause it was to bring a great blessing to the 
world, salvation from sin. 

121. How are we to regard the death of Jesus ? 

He died, the just one for the unjust, that He 
might bring them to God. 

122. What affections should we cherish towards Him 

who died for the sinful ? 
We should love Him with all our hearts as our 
Saviour, and worship Him and serve Him as 
our Lord. 

123. Where is Jesus now ? 

He is in the house of His Father in heaven, where 
He is preparing a place for all who bear His 
name and walk in His footsteps. 



THE END 



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